Ethnicity Matters in Healthcare

Author(s): Gurmukh Singh

There is increasing emphasis on excluding race in consideration of healthcare matters. This is mostly due to the history of discrimination based on race/ethnicity/social status etc. However, ethnicity has implications for the prevalence of disorders and responses to treatment. While excluding race/ ethnicity from consideration is a noble effort, it runs counter the philosophy of precision medicine demanding individualized care for each person. The opinion expressed in this article makes a case for including consideration of ethnicity as it may be relevant to the care of an individual, without using it to adversely discriminate a person from receiving optimal healthcare.