Research Review: Stroke Education Needs of African American Women

This report provides a comprehensive review of a research article titled "Stroke Education Needs of African American Women." The study investigated African American women's perspectives on stroke, including their understanding of its seriousness, causes, and consequences, as well as how they obtain health information. The research employed an exploratory-descriptive qualitative design, utilizing focus groups to gather data from 48 women aged 35 and above, recruited from black churches. Key findings revealed low awareness of stroke symptoms and risk factors, a greater concern for cancer, and reliance on family, acquaintances, and the internet for health information. The study highlighted the need for improved stroke education, suggesting the use of television programs, online resources, and community-based forums to increase awareness and understanding among African American women. The research also identified the importance of addressing social determinants of health, such as economic inequality and family responsibilities, which participants perceived as contributing to hypertension and stroke risk. The review emphasizes the study's contributions to understanding health disparities and the need for targeted interventions to improve stroke education within this population.

research article review
Stroke Education Needs of African American Women

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Abstract
The stroke burden is much higher for African American women as compared to the women of
various other ethnicities or races. It has been observed that the African American women can
survive for a year only after the stroke of ischemic and they also have the higher disability after
the stroke as compared to other women. The African American women are not aware exactly
about the stroke. Further, the African American women know the connection between the stroke
and hypertension, but they are not aware of the fact that irregular heartbeat and diabetes increase
the risk of stroke to a great extent. During the survey, the African American women were asked
about stroke, and around 16 percent of them answered it as burst or blocked the blood vessel.
Furthermore, the research paper will help in understanding that how the research was conducted
in order to find the answers to the research questions which are given in the next section.

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Research Question
The main motive of this research was to investigate the African American women’s perspective
about stroke and further investigate the information regarding their health by chasing the
practices external encounters of the Medicaid. Further, there were two research questions which
were being addressed in this research paper. Firstly, what are the African American women
perspective about the stroke’s seriousness, causes and the consequences? Secondly, how African
American women develop the information of health from the external encounters of Medicaid?

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Research Design of the Study
An exploratory-descriptive qualitative study was administered. Further, the qualitative methods
were used in order to the sensitive cultural research through the African American women. The
research mainly focused on the personal experience of the respondents and the forces of history,
culture and society were attended in order to shape up those personal experiences of life. The
researchers have considered the different perspectives of the same culture, cross-culture and their
own knowledge about a culture so that the research process may get impacted positively. Further,
the researchers used journals and the field notes in order to explore the issues and also discussed
the external status with the participants. The researchers needed the support in order to conduct
the research because they were not developing any research program rather they wanted to learn
about the education needs regarding stroke. Moreover, to conduct the study, the approval was
received from the review board of the university.

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Sample/Population of the Study
The sample/population of the study were 48 women of the age group of 35 and above which
were being hired from the black churches. The age 35 was being chosen for the sample at the
lower end because the occurrence of stroke between the age group 35 to 44 is much higher n
African American women as compared to White women. The age of respondents ranged 35 to 44
and the 68.6 years was the mean age. Among the 48 respondents, forty percent of them were
widowed, and the other forty percent were married. Further, around 53 percent of the
respondents had a graduate or college degree. Further, the risk factors of the stroke which were
being reported by the respondents contained triglycerides i.e. 42.6 percent, 12.8 percent for the
heart disease, 14.9 percent for the diabetes, 21.3 percent for the transient attack of ischemic and
83 percent of the respondents stated that the hypertension is the biggest risk factor for the stroke.

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Data Collection Method
The data were collected by 6 focus groups and are further analyzed through the analysis of
qualitative content. Those focus groups were clenched at the four black churches. Every group
contained six to ten women, and it lasted for ninety minutes approximately. Further, the open-
ended questions were asked of those African American women like why you wanted to attend
the group? From where do you get the information regarding your health conditions? What do
you know about stroke? What is the best method to learn about stroke according to you? etc.
These open-ended questions were developed from the initial meeting and the literature. The
answers were being recorded through a digital audio-recorder. Further, the transcriptions of
verbatim were created and reviewed for the better accuracy. The saturation of data was gained
after the last focus group i.e. is the fourth one. After collecting the data, the respondents were
given a gift card worth $25 to a national store.

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Limitations of the Study
During the research, it was observed that there was an occurrence of consensus between the
participants which made difficult for them to understand and describe the symptoms of stroke.
Further, the respondents found the symptoms of stroke very confusing when they were being
explained in the focus group. The effect of encouraging the ability of public in order to unfold
the symptoms of stroke was not known to some extent. Further, the sample size for the research
is very small in order to give the most accurate results.

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Findings
Based on the responses four categories were made. Firstly, we are no one to know anything
about stroke. Secondly, you are at a great risk, if you are a black. Thirdly, we are generally
concerned about cancer. Lastly, you cannot receive much information. Still many of the
participants clearly knew about the stroke that it came from the interaction with the
acquaintances or the family members which had strokes instead of health providers or campaigns
for stroke. There was also confusion regarding the various stroke symptoms and the information
about the symptoms of stroke might not offer meaningful demonstrations of the symptoms.
Further, the information regarding breast cancer was more available as compared to the
information related to stroke. Outside the encounters of medication, the main sources for the
information of health are television programs, other women and the internet. There was the
occurrence of uncertainty in order to access the solidity of the internet sites related to health.

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Summary of Article
This research paper helped in expanding the previous research which showed low awareness
among the African women regarding stroke by giving beliefs regarding the symptoms and the
causes of the stroke. This paper further helped in demonstrating the higher concern of women
towards cancer as compared to stroke. It helps in understanding that how African women seek
information about their health from the external encounters of the Medicaid. The research people
helps in identifying that people believe that stress is related to the inequality in the economy,
responsibilities of the families towards the problems of the health mainly hypertension. The
participants were not certain about the stroke’s psychology and were also lacked in
understanding the treatment of stroke. Therefore, forums of the groups, programming of the
televisions, and the learning depending on the web should be used as acceptable measures in
order to create awareness about stoke to African American women.

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REFERENCES
Beal, C. C. (2015). Stroke education needs of African American women. Public Health Nursing,
32(1), 24-33. doi:10.1111/phn.12158