• The issues health systems and/or hospitals face when catering to Spanish-Speaking Americans.
• The challenges Spanish-Speakers deal with when utilizing health systems and/or hospitals.
• The remedy adopted by health systems and/or hospitals to improve these issues and where they fall short.

Data Availability

• Although data availability is adequate regarding the challenges the Hispanic community encounter when attempting to access healthcare/hospitals, the initial round of research indicates that data availability specific to Spanish-speaking Hispanics is limited in the public domain.

Spanish Healthcare Experience

• A survey of Hispanics in the U.S. revealed that they experience significant health disparities.
• The survey explored the perspectives of 172 Hispanic adults regarding their healthcare experiences with the focus groups conducted in Spanish.
• Based on the survey, some of the healthcare barriers pointed out by the respondents include:
•  Long wait times and lack of timely appointments 
•  Lack of provider continuity 
•  Perceived poor quality care at a cost 
•  Perceived Discrimination (insurance-based discrimination and racial/ethnic discrimination)
• Lack of proper information 
•  Attentive and respectful communication.
• According to another survey, about a third of Latinos are not fluent in English, making the healthcare system less accessible to those of them who often need it the most.
• Latinos are still about 3 times more likely to be uninsured than non-Hispanic whites.

Summary

• We focused the initial hour of research on discovering the challenges Spanish-speaking Hispanics face when accessing healthcare/hospitals in the US.
• The initial research revealed that data availability specific to them is limited in the public domain.
• Notwithstanding, we found some information regarding the issues they experience when trying to access healthcare systems/hospitals.
• We recommend additional research to provide a deep-dive into the data points found during the initial hour of research and also provide the rest of the information required, such as the issues health systems and/or hospitals face when catering to Spanish-Speaking Americans and the remedy adopted by health systems and/or hospitals to improve these issues.
• We will focus on information that directly connects to health systems or hospitals and not other areas of health or general information.
• Also, we will leverage sources no older than 2016.
• Lastly, we recommend providing data about the general Hispanic community when there is limited information about Spanish-speaking Hispanics.
• For a deeper dive into the above-suggested research parts, we recommend further research. Details on our recommended research paths have been provided in our proposals below.