Sociologist Investigates Minority Exclusion in Medical Research: As a medical sociologist, Dr. Shawna V. Hudson is like a detective seeking clues as to how the health care system functions for people of different ethnic groups. She became interested in health care inequities as a Rutgers University doctoral student assisting a sociologist and a psychologist who were studying health issues among elderly African-Americans in the New Brunswick, N.J., area.
“I was really starting out with a focus on disparities — who has access, who doesn’t and how do we make sure we equalize the playing field — and trying to figure that out from a social approach,” she says. “As opposed to looking at it in terms of what do the big numbers say, what is going on at the local level? Why aren’t people getting access?”
