title: What do we know about the health of Spanish Roma people and what has been done to improve it? A scoping review.
abstract: Objectives:This study aims to review the published literature on the health of the Roma population in Spain, particularly that which describes health interventions and outcomes.Design:A scoping review of published articles/reports on Roma population health was carried out in Spain for publications between 2002 and 2014. Articles in Spanish or English were identified from Pubmed, Scopus, Science Direct, Web of Science, Scielo, IBECS, MEDES, Dialnet, Index Foundation, a database of theses and Google Scholar. After an initial assessment of the article title and summary, genetic studies, editorials, reviews and grey literature with incomplete data were excluded. Two independent researchers followed a protocol to analyze the selected papers in terms of general information, methodology, themes, and results or conclusions.Results:Forty studies were selected for inclusion, primarily located through PubMed and Google Scholar. Most of the papers were scientific articles, published after 2007 in Spanish scientific journals (70.0%) followed by institutional reports (20.0%). The main language was Spanish (84.2%). The studies were carried out mainly by public institutions (35.0%) or universities (22.5%). Most (67.5%) followed a descriptive design and nearly half (47.5%) were concerned only with the Roma population. The main thematic areas were: child health (25%), infectious diseases (25%), health and social education context (20%), perceived health and lifestyle (15%), sexual and reproductive health (7,5%) and health services use (7,5%). We found seven intervention studies related to health, educational environment, or social services.Conclusions:There are few publications related to the health of the Roma community in Spain and even fewer related to health interventions and outcomes. Those that are available have focused on areas such as child health or infectious disease outbreaks. It is important to promote health interventions in Roma communities and longitudinal studies that include a comprehensive vision and account for the social determinants of health.
authors.affiliation: a Department of Medicine, Nursing Area , School of Medicine and Health Sciences, University of Oviedo , Oviedo , Spain.
authors.forename: Ana
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Fernández-Feito
authors.affiliation: b Basic Health Zone Pisueña-Cayon, Primary Health Care of Cantabria , Santander , Spain.
authors.forename: Raúl
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Pesquera-Cabezas
authors.affiliation: c Primary Health Care of Cantabria , Mortera , Spain.
authors.forename: Carmen
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: González-Cobo
authors.affiliation: d Public Health Observatory of Cantabria, Marqués de Valdecilla Fundation , Cantabria , Spain.
authors.forename: M Dolores
authors.initials: MD
authors.lastname: Prieto-Salceda
mesh_terms: D006293:Health Promotion; D006304:Health Status; D006801:Humans; D009017:Morbidity; D006178:Romani People / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D013030:Spain / Q000453:epidemiology
keywords: Ethnic minority; Roma/gypsies; health disparities; health services accessibility; health status