Systemic Racial Bias in Health Care Delivery to Women

Introduction: The main hypothesis is that racial bias towards minority women perpetuates systemic racism in the U.S., health care system resulting in negative health outcomes and detrimental incidences. Methods: In this semi-systematic and literature review, an informational web-based search was used from the U.S. National Library of Medicine at the National Institutes of Health, Elsevier, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and ResearchGate. Inclusion criteria were adult women over the age of eighteen, women of color restricted to the United States only, and different areas of health care delivery. Results: This review found that women of color, especially black women, faced substantially more systemic racial bias in the United States health care delivery system and felt more excluded from adequate health care from clinicians due to racial discrimination. Discussion: There is very little literature on how to combat racial bias in health care delivery in the U.S. The mainframe of this stereotypical behavior from health care workers is conventional conscious and subconscious biases. Change needed for this type of behavior needs to start at the cognitive level