A new study finds that, despite efforts in the last decade to mitigate cancer treatment disparities, black patients are significantly less likely than white patients to receive therapy for various types of cancer.
The authors of the study conclude that efforts to close treatment gaps initiated in the 1990s appear to have had little impact. The report appears in the February 15, 2008 issue of CANCER, a peer-reviewed journal of the American Cancer Society.
Research that revealed racial disparities in cancer care began to appear in the early and 1990s, leading to greater attention and investment in ensuring access to care to all individuals. However, little is known about whether those efforts have led to any reduction in cancer treatment disparities.
To find out, Cary P. Gross, M.D. of the Yale University School of Medicine in New Haven, Conn. and colleagues mined the Surveillance, Epidemiology, and End Results (SEER)-Medicare database to evaluate cancer care received by Medicare beneficiaries diagnosed with breast, colorectal, lung or prostate cancer from 1992 through 2002. After identifying therapies for which racial disparities had been previously reported, the investigators determined whether there had been any changes in care for the over-all Medicare population or for white and black patients considered separately. A total of 7,775 colon, 1,745 rectal, 11,207 lung, 40,457 breast, and 82,238 prostate cancer cases were evaluated.