An exploratory study of the Cardiff Bangladeshi community in a primary care setting, prior to the development of culturally appropriate diabetes health education.

British Bangladeshis are one of the most economically deprived communities in Britain, with high morbidity and mortality rates from chronic illness. Access and use of their services is perceived by Primary Health Care Teams (PHCTs) to be difficult, due to communication and cultural barriers.

One-to-one tape-recorded interviews were held in Sylheti, Bengali or English with an age-stratified sample from the community registered with a practice in central Cardiff. The N*DIST package was used to analyse data, with ongoing discussion of emerging themes. The topics explored in these interviews were family structure and decision making within families, meal patterns, health beliefs, experiences of primary care and barriers to engaging with the outside world.

Family structure and social patterns had many similarities with those of the local community, and dietary and health beliefs also followed ‘Western’ concepts. People were anxious to be healthy, but often did not know about core primary care services. The community places value on the opinion and support of primary care professionals. However, a major cross-cutting theme was difficulty in accessing health care (especially for women), and reasons for this are discussed in the paper. With this information, the PHCT can now consider adapting itself to improve access and communication. We suggest that our methodological approach is both relevant and achievable for those working in primary care settings in our increasingly multi-cultural, ethnically mixed communities, and is not purely the province of sociologists or academics (important learning points have been identified and highlighted).