Healthcare disparities more often affect women and black heart disease patients

http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2015-11/aha-hdm103015.php

Public Release: 9-Nov-2015
Healthcare disparities more often affect women and black heart disease patients
Abstract 269 (Room W 203)
American Heart Association

Women with heart disease are less likely than men to receive optimal care at discharge from U.S. hospitals -- a gender disparity that leads to a higher death rate among women with heart disease, according to a study presented at the American Heart Association's Scientific Sessions 2015.

Black patients with heart disease also have a higher death rate after hospital discharge than white patients, but this disparity cannot be explained by the differences in hospitals' quality of care.

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Among the 16,130 deaths identified at the follow-up, researchers found women were less likely to receive optimal care at discharge and, when they received suboptimal care, were 23 percent more likely to die than men. The disparity disappeared when women received optimal care.

While researchers found no difference in care quality across racial and ethnic groups, as well as across geographic regions, they did uncover a 36 percent higher likelihood that blacks would die compared to whites. The disparity remained regardless of the care quality.

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