MEXICAN AMERICAN HEALTH CARE BEHAVIOR: A CRITICAL REVIEW OF THE LITERATURE

Reports & analyses of health care behavior of Mexican Amer's are reviewed & analyzed re their scope, methodology, content, reliability & usefulness for policy-makers & practitioners concerned with providing health care services. 3 stages in US health care studies are discerned: late 1940's--the pathbreaking work of Lyle Saunders; mid- to late 1960's--work by Margaret Clark, Arthur J. Rubel, & William Madsen; the 1960's--culture-based interpretations of Chicano health behavior. Most studies of Mexican-Amer health behavior are based on isolated village, agri'al labor & subsistence farming communities or on poverty-stricken Ur barrios. There are no systematic wide-ranging studies of health behavior & there is some evidence that the generalizations about the ubiquity of folk medicine are overdrawn. Census data indicate that projecting from Ru or agri'al pop's to Ur ones may be invalid. Existing data do not permit the conclusion that there is a Mexican Amer health care subculture--ie, that there is a distinctive Mexican Amer lifestyle that pervades commercial, educ'al, soc & health behavior. 3 basic issues should be addressed by new res (eg, through studies of hosp utilization, dental care, visitations to public vs private care providers): (1) Do individuals of Mexican heritage hold similar att's about illness & manifest similar preventative & curative traits regardless of age, SES or place of residence in the US? (2) Is utilization of private & public providers a function of cost, location or information; is symptomatology, SES or age the principal determinant(s)? (3) Is there higher utilization & repeat visitation of health services when Spanish-speaking providers & staff are present? M. Maxfield.