Barriers to access and ways to improve dementia services for a minority ethnic group in England

RATIONALE, AIMS, AND OBJECTIVES: There is a general lack of awareness and understanding of dementia within ethnic minority groups in the United Kingdom. There is also a dearth of research involving ethnic minority caregivers about reducing barriers to accessing services and optimizing engagements with religiously tailored interventions. This paper reports findings from a qualitative study that examined the barriers to health care service use in the Bangladeshi community living in the United Kingdom.

METHODS: The research draws on findings from a doctoral level research study on understanding dementia among the Bangladeshi community in England. The data for the doctoral research were gathered in two ways: (a) focus group discussions and (b) semi-structured interviews. All data were audio-recorded and analysed using thematic analysis. NVivo software was used to aid transcribing, coding, and interpretation of emergent themes.

RESULTS: The data showed that there were some barriers experienced by participants due to their religious and cultural beliefs and practices with other barriers related to the complexity of the UK health care system. Gender-based caregiving also appeared to interfere with religious ideologies while religiously appropriate health care services were deemed of great importance for successfully accessing those services.

CONCLUSIONS: The findings provide an understanding of the experiences of the Bangladeshi community when seeking to access mainstream UK health care services and may help to provide useful directions for future research.