Author Interviews, Cost of Health Care, Dermatology, Gender Differences, JAMA, Medicare, Race/Ethnic Diversity / 18.02.2021

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Lauren A. V. Orenstein, MD | She/her/hers Assistant Professor of Dermatology Robert A. Swerlick, MD Professor and Alicia Leizman Stonecipher Chair of Dermatology Emory University School of Medicine Atlanta, GA 30322 MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: Financial incentives have the potential to drive provider behavior, even unintentionally. The aim of this study was to evaluate differences in clinic “productivity” measures that occur in outpatient dermatology encounters. Specifically, we used data from 2016-2020 at one academic dermatology practice to evaluate differences in work relative value units (wRVUs, a measure of clinical productivity) and financial reimbursement by patient race, sex, and age. 66,463 encounters were included in this study, among which 70.1% of encounters were for white patients, 59.6% were for females, and the mean age was 55.9 years old. (more…)
Author Interviews, COVID -19 Coronavirus, Education, Race/Ethnic Diversity, Social Issues / 04.02.2021

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Ankur Dalsania Rutgers New Jersey Medical School (NJMS) M.D. Candidate 2021 MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: Similar to past pandemics, prior studies and news articles have highlighted the disproportionate impact of COVID-19 mortality in marginalized populations, especially Black Americans. Rather than biological differences, other factors like neighborhood conditions, educational attainment, economic stability, healthcare access, and social contexts have been hypothesized to influence the racial disparities. Using county-level data, we sought to quantitatively determine how these factors, collectively referred to as social determinants of health, impact COVID-19 mortality in Black Americans.  (more…)
Author Interviews, CDC, JAMA, OBGYNE / 03.02.2021

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Jiajia Chen, PhD Division of Reproductive Health National Center for Chronic Disease Prevention and Health Promotion Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Atlanta, Georgia MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: Severe maternal morbidity (SMM) includes a range of serious pregnancy complications that result in significant short-term or long-term consequences to a woman’s health. Most research and prevention efforts addressing SMM focus on the delivery hospitalization, but less is known about SMM diagnosed after delivery discharge. (more…)
Author Interviews, COVID -19 Coronavirus, JAMA, Race/Ethnic Diversity, Social Issues / 29.01.2021

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Renuka Tipirneni, MD, MSc, FACP Assistant Professor Holder of the Grace H. Elta MD Department of Internal Medicine Early Career Endowment Award 2019-2024 University of Michigan Department of Internal Medicine, Divisions of General Medicine and Hospital Medicine, and Institute for Healthcare Policy & Innovation Ann Arbor, MI MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: As there have been significant racial/ethnic disparities in US COVID-19 infections and health outcomes including death, we investigated county-level social factors that may explain these inequities. Specifically, we examined the association between the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s Social Vulnerability Index (a composite measure of social disadvantage) and COVID-19 incidence and mortality rates. We found that with just a one-point increase in the ten-point scale, there was a 14% increase in incidence rate and 14% increase in mortality rate. This equated to approximately 87 excess COVID-19 infections and 3 deaths per 100,000 population.  (more…)
Author Interviews, COVID -19 Coronavirus, Infections, JAMA, NYU, Race/Ethnic Diversity / 04.12.2020

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Gbenga Ogedegbe, MD, MPH Dr. Adolph & Margaret Berger Professor of Population Health Director, Division of Health & Behavior Director Center for Healthful Behavior Change Department of Population Health NYU Langone Health NYU School of Medicine MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: The background for the study is the disproportionately higher rates of COVID-19 hospitalizations and deaths in Blacks and Hispanics compared to Whites in major cities across the country. We asked two questions: 1) are there racial/ethnic differences in COVID-19 outcomes (likelihood of testing positive, hospitalizations, severe illness, and deaths) among patients who receive care at NYU Langone Health? If there are differences, are they explained by comorbidity and neighborhood characteristics (poverty, educational status, employment, housing, proportion of Blacks and Hispanics in communities)? (more…)
Author Interviews, Cannabis, Ophthalmology, Race/Ethnic Diversity, Social Issues / 09.11.2020

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Joshua Uhr MD Ophthalmologist Philadelphia, PA MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: Disparities in American society have been at the forefront of the public consciousness in recent months. As part of the larger discussion about inequality, disparities in health outcomes have received much attention. In light of the renewed recognition that these disparities are stark and widespread, we felt it important to evaluate disparities in our own field, ophthalmology. Previous studies have shown disparate outcomes for individual eye conditions, such as glaucoma, cataract, and retinal detachment. Although the common and relevant endpoint of these is visual impairment, few prior studies have examined disparities in visual impairment more broadly. Our aim was to provide an updated analysis of disparity in visual impairment among adults in the United States based on race and socioeconomic status.  (more…)
Author Interviews, COVID -19 Coronavirus, Race/Ethnic Diversity, Rheumatology, UCSF / 07.11.2020

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Milena Gianfrancesco, PhD, MPH Assistant Professor. Education Division of Rheumatology, Department of Medicine University of California, San Francisco MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: This study utilized data from the COVID-19 Global Rheumatology Alliance Provider Survey, which launched on March 25th. To date, it has collected information on over 6,000 patients with rheumatic disease diagnosed with COVID-19 from over 40 countries worldwide. As COVID-19 spread across the world in the spring, and especially within the United States, it became clear that the disease was impacting certain groups more than others. Growing attention and research began to illustrate the disproportionate burden of COVID-19 among racial/ethnic minorities in the United States. We know that racial and ethnic minorities experience a higher burden of rheumatic disease risk and severity; therefore, our group was interested in examining whether the disproportionate burden of COVID-19 also affected this susceptible population. (more…)
Author Interviews, Baylor College of Medicine Houston, Heart Disease, Social Issues, Tobacco Research / 19.10.2020

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Mahmoud Al Rifai MD MPH Section of Cardiology, Department of Medicine Baylor College of Medicine Houston Salim S. Virani, MD, PhD Section of Cardiology Michael E. DeBakey Veterans Affairs Medical Center Section of Cardiology, Department of Medicine Baylor College of Medicine Houston    MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: E-cigarettes typically cost more than combustible cigarettes and there is more variability in cost due to a wide variety of flavors, e-cigarette liquid, and vaping device that are available in the market. Therefore, use of e-cigarettes may vary depending on income with potentially higher use among higher income individuals. (more…)
Author Interviews, Kidney Disease / 16.10.2020

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Mallika Mendu, MD, MBA MedicalDirector of Clinical Operations Brigham and Women’s Hospital MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings? Response: African-Americans with chronic kidney disease have poorer outcomes with respect to hypertension control, timely nephrology referral, progression to end stage renal disease, placement of vascular access and transplantation compared to other racial groups. For the past two decades a race multiplier has been applied in equations that estimate glomerular filtration rate (a proxy for kidney function) for African-Americans. We sought to determine whether what the impact of the race multiplier term was on care delivered to African-Americans, by using our health system-wide CKD registry. We were particularly focused on advanced CKD patient outcomes, knowing that there are health disparities that could be potentially exacerbated.

The original CKD-EPI and MDRD studies showed an association between African-American race with higher measured GFR at the same blood creatinine concentration. However, there have been concerns raised about the application of the race multiplier to all African-American patients. First, there is no clear biological explanation for the association, the identification of Black race was unclear in some of the cohorts used in these studies, and there is vast genetic and ancestral heterogeneity among those who self-identify as black. The use of the race multiplier also ignores the fact that race is a social, not biological construct.

We found that with the removal of the race multiplier, up to one in every three African-American patients would be reclassified as having a more severe stage of CKD, with one-quarter of African-American patients going from stage 3 to stage 4. We also found that with the removal of the race multiplier, 64 patients would have had an eGFR <20, the threshold for referral for kidney transplant, and none of these patients were referred, evaluated or waitlisted for transplant. This is in contrast, to those African-American patients with an eGFR <20 with the race multiplier applied, who had a higher odds of being referred, evaluated or waitlisted for transplant compared to other racial groups (Odds ratio of 2.28, compared to White cohort).

(more…)
Author Interviews, COVID -19 Coronavirus, JAMA, Social Issues / 01.10.2020

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Dr. Madhur Garg, MD MBA Clinical director, Radiation Oncology Montefiore Health System and Professor Departments of Otorhinolaryngology - Head & Neck Surgery - and Urology Albert Einstein College of Medicine  MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: ​The Bronx was hit particularly hard with Covid-19 - making up one of the highest per capita cases and deaths in the country. Montefiore Health System and Albert Einstein College of Medicine, care for a large population of ethnic minorities (non-Hispanic Black and Hispanic individuals make up 65% of our patient population). (more…)
Author Interviews, Cancer Research, ESMO, Race/Ethnic Diversity, Social Issues / 21.09.2020

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Ziad Bakouny, MD, MSc Post-doctoral research fellow Lank Center for Genitourinary Oncology Dana-Farber Cancer Institute MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: The COVID-19 pandemic has disproportionately affected patients with cancer, with these patients unfortunately having worse outcomes than the general population. In fact, a recent report by the COVID-19 and Cancer Consortium (CCC19) showed that the mortality rate in patients with cancer who develop COVID-19, at 30 days median follow-up, was 16%. Although the adverse outcomes of patients with cancer who develop COVID-19 has received much attention, few studies have thus far investigated the effects of the potential disruption to cancer care delivery caused by the pandemic. Our aim in the COVID and Cancer Outcomes Study (CCOS) was therefore to evaluate this disruption to cancer care caused by the pandemic. This is a multicenter prospective cohort study that included patients seen in the outpatient setting at the Tisch Cancer Institute, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai in New York City and the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute in Boston during one week in March (between March 2 and March 6 2020). Data was collected 3 months before this index week and 3 months prospectively (during the first peak of the pandemic in the Northeastern United States). (more…)
Author Interviews, Brigham & Women's - Harvard, Exercise - Fitness, Race/Ethnic Diversity, Social Issues / 03.08.2020

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Marc Weisskopf, PhD, ScD Cecil K. and Philip Drinker Professor of Environmental Epidemiology and Physiology Departments of Environmental Health and Epidemiology Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health Boston, MA 02115  MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: There is a long history of health disparities by race. We were interested to see whether these also show up in professional football players, with the thought that perhaps the advantages that come with being an elite athlete in a sport (e.g. related to income, potential access to carte, prestige) might minimize health disparities. (more…)
Author Interviews, JAMA, Race/Ethnic Diversity, Social Issues / 03.08.2020

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Nasim B. Ferdows, Ph.D. Assistant Professor, Department of Health Administration and Policy Hudson College of Public Health The University of Oklahoma Health Sciences Center Oklahoma City, OK MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: This half a century study of US senior men and women who died between 1968 and 2016 shows how disparities in the Black and White mortality of older US citizens have changed over time, as well as how the racial disparities differ in rural, suburban and urban areas. (more…)
Author Interviews, CDC, Diabetes, Gender Differences, Race/Ethnic Diversity / 29.06.2020

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Giuseppina Imperatore, MD, PHD CDC, Atlanta MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: The lifetime risk of diabetes (LRD), a probability of developing diabetes during a person’s lifespan, is a measure of future disease burden that reflects the impact of incidence (occurrence of new cases per year) and mortality. The years of potential life lost to diabetes (YPLLD) is the number of life-years lost due to diabetes, calculated as the difference between the life expectancy of a person without diabetes and a person with diabetes at the age of diagnosis. For example, the number of life-years lost for a person diagnosed at age 20 years is the difference in life expectancy of a person who died without developing diabetes and a person who was diagnosed with diabetes at 20 years of age.  Both incidence and mortality of diabetes have been decreasing for more than a decade. The effects of those changes on lifetime risk of diabetes and years of potential life lost to diabetes are not known. In this study, we used nationally representative diabetes surveillance data to provide updated estimates for the lifetime probability of development of diabetes, and to assess changes in incidence and mortality on lifetime risk and life-years lost due to diabetes in the USA. (more…)
Author Interviews, JAMA, OBGYNE, Pediatrics / 11.06.2020

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Colm Travers, M.D., MSPH Assistant Professor Department of Pediatrics University of Alabama at Birmingham MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: It is known that black mothers are much more likely to deliver preterm and low birth weight infants. The purpose of this study was to determine whether racial/ethnic disparities in care practices and outcomes were decreasing or increasing among extremely preterm infants. These are infants born from 22 to 27 weeks of gestation who have a high risk of death and major illnesses.  (more…)
Author Interviews, COVID -19 Coronavirus, Race/Ethnic Diversity / 21.05.2020

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Charles H. Hennekens, MD, DrPH Sir Richard Doll Professor Senior Academic Advisor FAU, Boca Raton, FL  MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: Blacks and other disadvantaged minorities in the United States have markedly reduced life expectancies compared with their white counterparts.  As is the case with most fatal diseases, coronavirus disease (COVID-19) is already taking a disproportionate toll on blacks and other disadvantaged minorities. (more…)
Author Interviews / 23.01.2020

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Dr. Lindsay Sabik, Ph.D. Associate Professor Graduate School of Public Health Department of Health Policy and Management University of Pittsburgh  MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: In 2006, Massachusetts passed a health insurance reform law with the aim of providing health care access to nearly all of its residents. My colleagues and I pulled data from the Massachusetts Cancer Registry on all colorectal and breast cancer cases in people ages 50- to 64-years-old from 2001 through 2013. We selected those two cancers for our study because both are common, have routine screening guidelines and have high survival rates when caught early. The age range captured people covered by the recommended screening guidelines but not old enough to qualify for Medicare. We also pulled similar data from several other states for comparison. (more…)
Author Interviews, Beth Israel Deaconess, Race/Ethnic Diversity / 17.01.2020

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: John Danziger, MD Harvard Medical Faculty Physicians, Nephrology Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: Racial health disparities have long been described, extending even into the highest levels of medical care, namely the Intensive Care Unit (ICU). Accordingly, we wanted to know whether improvements in ICU care seen over the last decade are equally observed in minority and non-minority serving hospitals. (more…)
Author Interviews, Health Care Systems, JAMA, Social Issues / 14.01.2020

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Elizabeth Tung MD MS Section of General Internal Medicine Instructor of Medicine University of Chicago MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: Medicare provides hospital ratings for all Medicare-certified hospitals in the U.S. based on quality metrics, including mortality, patient experience, hospital readmissions, and others. While ratings are important for comparing hospitals, there's been some concern that some of these quality metrics are outside a hospital's control, especially for hospitals taking care of vulnerable or socially complex patient populations. Take "timeliness of care" as a quality metric, for instance--this measure includes emergency room wait times. But in places that are medically underserved and have very few emergency rooms, these wait times will inevitably be much higher. What this means is that hospitals taking care of medically underserved populations end up getting lower quality ratings, even though they're addressing health disparities by filling an access gap. (more…)
Author Interviews, Education, JAMA, Opiods, Social Issues / 28.08.2019

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Isaac Sasson, PhD Department of Sociology and Anthropology and the Herczeg Institute on Aging Tel Aviv University Tel Aviv, Israel MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: Life expectancy at birth in the United States has been declining steadily since 2014, which is very unusual for a high-income country in times of peace. In fact, the last time that life expectancy declined in the US was in the early 1990s, and only briefly. Studies from the past few years have shown that the rise in mortality is concentrated among middle-aged Americans and particularly the lower socioeconomic classes. Our study analyzed over 4.6 million death records in 2010 and 2017 to understand which causes of death account for the rise in mortality among white and black non-Hispanic US adults. In addition, given the substantial socioeconomic inequality in health in the US, we broke down our results by level of education, which is a good proxy for socioeconomic status. Essentially, our goal was to measure how many years of life were lost, on average, to each cause of death across different social groups.  (more…)
BMJ, Gender Differences / 25.07.2019

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Dr Crystal Lee BMedSc(Hons), MIPH, PhD, MBiostat Senior Research Fellow School of Psychology and Public Health La Trobe University Honorary Research Fellow The Boden Institute of Obesity, Nutrition, Exercise & Eating Disorders The University of Sydney Adjunct Senior Research Fellow School of Public Health | Curtin University  MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response:  Coronary heart disease (CHD) is a leading cause of death and disability worldwide. Primary care has been shown to play an important role in the secondary prevention of cardiovascular disease. Yet, studies in Australia and elsewhere from as far back as two decades ago identified gaps in the management of CHD patients in primary care. We analysed records of 130,926 patients with a history of CHD from 438 general practices across Australia to determine whether sex disparities exist in the management of CHD according to current clinical guidelines. (more…)
Author Interviews, JAMA, NIH, Race/Ethnic Diversity / 25.07.2019

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Lan N. Đoàn, MPH CPH PhD Candidate, School of Social and Behavioral Health Sciences College of College of Public Health and Human Sciences Oregon State University, Corvallis MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: There is a prevailing stereotype that Asian American, Native Hawaiian, and Pacific Islander (AA/NHPI) populations are a model minority group - healthier than all other racial/ethnic groups. As a result, health researchers often consider AA/NHPI so similar that their data is typically grouped together which masks their cultural and health differences. However, AA/NHPI populations represent more than 50 countries or cultures of origin and 100 different languages and have unique health needs and cultural preferences. Prior research has found minimal financial investments in AA/NHPI populations by federal agencies and philanthropy, even though AA/NHPI individuals represent more than 5.0% of the total US population and are the fastest-growing racial/ethnic group in the United States. The purpose of study was to conduct a review of clinical research funded by the National Institutes of Health (NIH) for AA/NHPI populations and to determine the level of NIH investment in serving these populations. We queried the NIH Research Portfolio Online Reporting Tools Expenditures and Results (RePORTER) system for extramural AA/NHPI focused clinical research projects conducted in the United States from January 1, 1992, to December 31, 2018. We included clinical research funded under research project grants, centers, cooperative awards, research career awards, training grants, and fellowships was included, with an advanced text search for AA/NHPI countries and cultures of origin.  (more…)
Author Interviews, JAMA, Smoking, Social Issues, Tobacco Research, UCSD / 11.01.2019

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Eric Leas PhD, MPH Stanford Prevention Research Center University of California, San Diego MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings? Response: Recent research has demonstrated the importance that neighborhood context has on life opportunity, health and well-being that can perpetuate across generations. A strongly defining factor that leads to differences in health outcomes across neighborhoods, such as differences in chronic disease, is the concurrent-uneven distribution of modifiable risk factors for chronic disease. The main goal of our study was to characterize inequities in smoking, the leading risk factor for chronic disease, between neighborhoods in America's 500 largest cities. To accomplish this aim we used first-of-its-kind data generated from the 500 Cities Project—a collaboration between Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention—representing the largest effort to provide small-area estimates of modifiable risk factors for chronic disease. We found that inequities in smoking prevalence are greater within cities than between cities, are highest in the nation’s capital, and are linked to inequities in chronic disease outcomes. We also found that inequities in smoking were associated to inequities in neighborhood characteristics, including race, median household income and the number of tobacco retailers.  (more…)
Author Interviews, JAMA, Johns Hopkins, Social Issues / 06.01.2019

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Megan Wallace, DrPH Department of Epidemiology Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health Baltimore, Maryland MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings? Response: Local health departments are often evaluated on a nationwide or statewide basis, however, given diversity among counties that exists even at the state level, we felt there might be a better way to group health departments for evaluation. In this study, we created county-level clusters using local characteristics most associated with the outcomes of interest, which were smoking, motor vehicle crash deaths, and obesity. We then compared county-level percentile rankings for the outcomes within sociodemographic peer clusters vs nationwide rankings. We identified 8 groups of counties with similar local characteristics. Percentile ranks for the outcomes of interest often differed when counties were compared within their peer groups in comparison with a nationwide scale.  (more…)
Aging, Author Interviews, Social Issues / 25.06.2018

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Bryan D. James, PhD Assistant Professor Rush Alzheimer's Disease Center Chicago, IL 60612 MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings? Response: This study is part of a larger body of research examining how literacy and decision making abilities in different areas of life can affect the health and well-being of older adults. The main finding of this study is that a better ability to understand and utilize financial concepts was related to a lower risk of hospitalization in old age. Additionally, research conducted from financial services firm Sambla, Norway's largest bank and lender for medical loans, found that doctors and pharmacists are among Scandinavia's financial services most financially savvy, often saving for retirement 5-7 years before others working in the medical field. Over almost 2 years of follow-up, 30 percent of the 388 older men and women in this study were hospitalized at least once. A 4-point higher score on the scale of financial literacy, representing one standard deviation, was associated with about a 35 percent lower risk of hospitalization. This was after adjusting for a number of factors including physical and mental health indicators and income. The association appeared to be stronger for knowledge of financial concepts such as stocks and bonds, as opposed to the ability to perform numerical calculations. Additionally, the association was stronger for elective hospital admissions as opposed to emergency or urgent hospitalizations; this may support the notion that financial literacy is related to medical decision-making surrounding the decision to be hospitalized, such as which procedures are covered by Medicare. (more…)
Author Interviews, Cancer Research, CDC / 07.07.2017

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Lisa C. Richardson, MD, MPH, Oncologist Director,Division of Cancer Prevention and Control CDC MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: This MMWR report is the first complete description of cancer incidence and mortality comparing rural and urban America.  From previous reports we know that rural residents are more likely to be older, have more comorbid conditions and participate in high risk behaviors that can lead to cancer. CDC researchers were interested in how these factors were related to new cancers and cancer deaths in rural counties compared to metropolitan counties. Researchers found that rates of new cases for lung cancer, colorectal cancer, and cervical cancer were higher in rural America. In contrast, rural areas were found to have lower rates of new cancers of the female breast, and prostate. Rural counties had higher death rates from lung, colorectal, prostate, and cervical cancers. (more…)
Author Interviews, Breast Cancer, JAMA, MD Anderson, Race/Ethnic Diversity / 20.06.2014

Dalliah Black, MD F.A.C.S. Department of Surgical Oncology The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, HoustonMedicalResearch.com Interview with: Dalliah Black, MD F.A.C.S. Department of Surgical Oncology The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, Houston   MedicalResearch: What are the main findings of the study? Dr. Black: This is a retrospective study from 2002 - 2007 using the SEER/Medicare database of over 31,000 women with node negative breast cancer evaluating the utilization of sentinel node biopsy (SNB) as it transitioned from an optional method for axillary staging to the standard of care instead of complete axillary lymph node dissection (ALND).  We found that SNB use increased each year in both white and black breast cancer patients throughout the study period.  However, SNB was less often performed in black patients (62.4%)compared to white patients (73.7%) and this disparity persisted through 2007 with a 12% difference.  Appropriate black patients more often had an ALND instead of the minimally invasive sentinel node biopsy which resulted in worse patient outcomes with higher lymphedema rates in black patients.  However, when black patients received the minimally invasive SNB, their rates of lymphedema were low and comparable to white patients who received SNB. (more…)
HIV, Infections, JAMA, Race/Ethnic Diversity / 21.06.2013

MedicalResearch.com Interview with Dr. H. Irene Hall, PhD Division of HIV/AIDS Prevention National Center for HIV/AIDS, Viral Hepatitis, STD, and TB Prevention, CDC 1600 Clifton Road, MS E-47, Atlanta, GA 30333 MedicalResearch.com: What are the main findings of the study? Dr. Hall: Our research finds that, across all populations, far too few Americans with HIV receive the care they need to stay healthy and reduce risk of transmission. According to our research, gaps in care are the largest among African Americans and young people. Moving forward, improving care for all HIV-infected people will be critical to achieving the goal of an AIDS-free generation in America. More specifically, some of the key findings of the study include:
  • Overall, only a quarter of all Americans with HIV have a suppressed viral load – meaning the level of HIV in their bodies is low enough to stay healthy and dramatically reduce the chance of transmitting to others.
  • By race/ethnicity, African-Americans and Hispanics or Latinos are less likely to be aware of their infection compared to whites.
  •  By age, younger Americans are less likely to be in ongoing care and have a suppressed viral load; HIV care and viral suppression generally improved with age. For example:
  • Fifteen percent of those aged 25-34 were virally suppressed, compared to 36 percent of those aged 55-64.
  • In terms of ongoing care, 28 percent of those 25-34 years old were retained in care, compared to 46 percent of those aged 55-64. (more…)