Culture is a shared way of living, and it also include our beliefs, values and behaviors. All cultures have their own system of health beliefs to explain what causes illness, how it can be cured, treated and who should be involved in the process. In this paper I will be focusing on African American. African Americans who are also called Black Americans. They are one of the largest ethnic group that reside in the USA. Also, they were brought to the U.S from different part of the World such as West Indies and South America. They are primarily of African descent, but many of them have non-black ancestors. In July 2017, 41.4 million individuals within the United States were black alone, which represents 12.7 percent of the whole populace. African Americans are the second biggest minority population, taking after the Hispanic/Latino populace. In 2017, most blacks lived within the South (58 percent of the Black Americans in U.S. populace), whereas 27 percent of the white populace lived within the South. The ten states with the biggest dark populace in 2017 were Texas, Georgia, Florida, Modern York, North Carolina, California, Illinois, Modern Shirt, Virginia, Louisiana. Combined, these 10 states represent 58% of the entire black communities (African American Profile, 2018).

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           To begin with, in African American culture, the father is the one that make most of the decisions while the mother ruled the house. Perhaps, there is a great interaction and strong bonding amongst the families. Also, they support each other by visiting and helping in terms of needs and trouble. In addition, the Black culture belief that titles such as Ms., Mrs. or Miss are used as a sign of respect. Elderly are highly respected in the African American communities, they turn to belief they are too closer to their ancestors. People in the African American community view illnesses as a sign of their bad doing and turn to blame themselves.
            The African American diet influences their health and well-being. Black Americans have a higher risk of hypertension and stroke in light of their “southern” diet. A “southern” diet comprises of a lot of deep fry food, processed meats, eggs, high-fat dairy, sugary treats and breads. Other things that lead to hypertension is due to the lack of fruits and vegetables, fiber-rich grains, healthy fats, poor diet and many other foods that promote health blood and heart health (Norton, 2018). Due to their poor diet, African Americans are genetically inclined to certain medical conditions including heart disease, strokes, cancer, asthma, influenzas, and HIV/AIDS (African American Profile, 2018). These medical conditions when combined with their diets increment the chance that they will ended up very sick. With information of their inclined therapeutic conditions, this group of individuals ought to have better access to health care. In 2015, as it were 54.4 percent of African Americans were enlisted beneath a private health insurance arrange, 43.6 percent were enrolled in Medicaid open health protections, and 11 percent of the populace was uninsured (African American Profile, 2018). Without government programs such as Medicaid, these numbers would be much lower. Such programs point to grow get to health care to all citizens. It fell brief of that objective, but it did grow health care to numerous more than some time recently. African Americans tend to neglect medical appointment because they belief it is not as important as family and friend. African American patient feel offended when you smell their hair and they always like to be included in decision making about their health. Moreover, open ended questions are most preferable when interviewing them about their health. African American due to their poor diet typical have higher issues of hypertension and diabetes.
            More so, Black Americans believe strongly in Christianity although some of them are Islam and others. They recognize prayer as a mode of communication to God. They believe that praying for one’s health does not required a certain period. Most Of them usually serve God more by going to church every Sunday in times of trouble. Religion belief have a huge impact on health care as most of them usually deny going to the hospital in time of illness due to their strong belief that God is the healer of everything and how good their faith is. In addition, most of them believe that a good physician ought to talk more to them about their faith, spirituality instead of their biological hospital. Also, they turn to mistrust their physician if they don’t acknowledge their religious aspect.  African Americans have a huge perspective or a religious orientation that’s grounded within the cultural and social history which may affirm the all-encompassing approach to health and healthcare in general. For the black, religion could be a dependable source of enormous emotional support. There’s a high probability of religious and medical perspectives that are distinctive and might struggle. Although, Religious beliefs and practices may vary significantly even among people from the same religion and group, Christian groups or churches show a sense of belonging to the blacks. During the early times when they worked as slaves, churches played a huge part because that’s the only place they would meet openly and interact. Most of the movements started in churches as well; hence the attachment of the blacks and affiliation with churches started long ago (Noonan, 2016).
      In conclusion, The African American culture may be a wide subject. This paper has fair highlighted a few of the element such as religion, and healthcare beliefs. From these focuses, we see that the African American culture is special and has a few compelling components to other societies, particularly when it comes to health. This research paper has also made me understand most African American fail to receive medical treatment since they beliefs strongly in their culture.
References

Norton, A. (2018, October 02).Study Blames ‘Southern’ Diet for Black Health Woes. (2018, October 2). https://www.webmd.com/diet/news/20181002/study-blames-southern-diet-for-black-health-woes#1
African American Profile. (2018). (n.d.). Retrieved from https://www.minorityhealth.hhs.gov/omh/browse.aspx?lvl=3&lvlid=61
Noonan, A. S., Velasco-Mondragon, H. E., & Wagner, F. A. (2016, October 3). Improving the health of African Americans in the USA: an overdue opportunity for social justice. Retrieved from https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5810013/
Religion, Health Medicine in African Implications for … (n.d.). Retrieved from https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Linda_Chatters/publication/8019983_Religion_Health_and_Medicine_in_African_Americans_Implications_for_Physicians/links/02bfe5111366daf340000000/Religion-Health-and-Medicine-in-African-Americans-Implications-for-Physicians.pdf