What role might physician education play in improving early identification and treatment of minorities?
That is another factor that is hard to quantify. It may be that the physicians examining patients in settings such as the inner-city hospital may be unwittingly contributing to delays in diagnosis and treatment. In the usual setting in which many minority patients receive healthcare, there is likely to be high volume. That’s because minorities are more likely to be receiving medical care from primary care physicians, who typically see lots of people and may have less time to spend with individual patients. This begs the question as to whether there is appropriate reimbursement for such physicians to screen patients for signs of dementia, and if so, what would be the appropriate tests or screening tools that should be used? Most physicians use something called the Mini-Mental State Exam (MMSE), which is a test that was validated and originated by two geriatric psychologists in Baltimore. Some psychologists who test minority groups, such as Yaakov Stern, Ph.D., and Jennifer Manley, Ph.D.
