Debates over who is Hispanic and who is not have often fueled conversations about identity among Americans who trace their heritage to Latin America or Spain. Most recently, the 2020 census has drawn attention to how Hispanic identity is defined and measured.

Rates of mental health-related emergency department visits are highest among non-Hispanic Black adults, according to research.

Zachary J. Peters, M.P.H., from the Public Community for Wellbeing Measurements in Hyattsville, Maryland, and partners depict crisis division visits connected with psychological well-being issues among grown-ups and analyzed contrasts in visit attributes by race and Hispanic identity utilizing information from the 2018 to 2020 Public Emergency clinic Walking Clinical Consideration Review.

The researchers found that the rates of mental health-related emergency department visits were highest among non-Hispanic Black, followed by non-Hispanic White and Hispanic adults (96.8, 53.4, and 36.0 per 1,000 adults, respectively).

The most noteworthy paces of crisis division visits for explicit psychological well-being problems, including substance use issues, nervousness issues, and mind-set issues, were likewise seen for non-Hispanic Blacks. Medicaid was the normal essential wellspring of installment in a higher level of visits by Hispanic and non-Hispanic Dark versus non-Hispanic White grown-ups (57.7 and 49.5 percent, separately, versus 36.1 percent).

"This aligns with prior research assessing pediatric use of emergency departments for mental health disorders and could be expected given that rates of emergency department visits overall are higher among non-Hispanic Black people," the authors write.

So, who is considered Hispanic in the U.S. today? How exactly are Hispanics counted? What role does race play in deciding who is counted as Hispanic? And how do surveys incorporate the various terms people use to describe their Hispanic identity, such as Latina or Latinx?