Diabetes care for ethnic minorities

Not only are people from ethnic minority backgrounds more likely to have diabetes, they also receive poorer quality care from the NHS, a new study claims.

Researchers from Imperial College, London, found that diabetes control was "significantly worse" in south Asians.

They studied the treatment received in 2002 by 21,343 diabetic patients in three north-west London primary care trusts (PCTs): Ealing, Hammersmith and Fulham, and Hounslow.

The results showed that although diabetes control was worse among south Asians, a smaller proportion of this group were prescribed insulin.

And although the white population studied was older, blood pressure differences between the groups were small. This, the researchers claim, indicates poorer control in non-white ethnic groups.

Writing in the International Journal for Equity in Health, the researchers suggest a number of reasons for the disparity.

They propose the poorer quality of care for Asian diabetic patients could be due to the standard of care offered by GPs or because of patient factors – such as poor understanding of the disease.

Institutional racism is unlikely as many south Asians are registered with GPs from their own ethnic group, the researchers conclude.

Researcher Dr Michael Soljak said the study highlights the need to capture ethnicity data in clinical trials and in routine care in order to be able to investigate the reasons for the differences in care.

"There should be more intensive management of diabetes and education about the disease in south Asian patients. The best option would be trials comparing different types of such interventions," he added.