Does preference matter? An examination of health care preferences among African American and Hispanic older adults

Background: Preliminary studies have revealed that client-provider racial/ethnic concordance is an effective cultural competence technique. Previous research has found that clients that are treated by a provider of the same race/ethnicity are more satisfied with the care they receive. There are, however, some studies that have found that racial/ethnic concordance only effects satisfaction for clients that had a preference to have a provider of the same race/ethnicity. Objective: The purpose of this study was to compare the effect of racial/ethnic concordance on overall satisfaction with care received for clients that did and did not have a preference for a provider of the same race/ethnicity. Methods: The respondents were 330 African Americans/Blacks and 204 Hispanics/Latinos ages 50 and older that responded to a national telephone survey. The direct and interactive roles of the predictive variables were examined in order to explore between-group differences and within-group variability. Results: The results from this study indicate that client provider racial/ethnic concordance may not be a universally effective cultural competence technique for older racial/ethnic minorities and that the unique preferences of clients should be considered when providing health care.