Grappling With Racial Health Inequity in Pediatric Cardiology

Abstract

Incessant racial health inequalities across nearly every major health index reveals less about what patients have failed to feel and more about what systems have failed to do. 1

Addressing Disparities in Pediatric Congenital Heart Disease: A Call for Equitable Health Care

“…Interestingly, implicit bias from health care providers has been identified as a potential contributing factor to these disparities. 18 , 19 A study demonstrated the significant impact implicit bias has on provider decision making and judgments for their patients. 20 …”

“… 80 Multiple studies have shown that racial concordance between the physician and patient leads to better health outcomes. 19 , 80 , 81 For example, Greenwood et al found that the infant mortality rate for Black infants under the care of a Black physician halved compared with Black infants under the care of a White physician. 19 , 81 The Heritable Disorders in Newborns and Children now require CCHD screening as part of the Uniform Screening Panel for newborns to include additional testing to detect and diagnose a wider range of illnesses.…”

“… 19 , 80 , 81 For example, Greenwood et al found that the infant mortality rate for Black infants under the care of a Black physician halved compared with Black infants under the care of a White physician. 19 , 81 The Heritable Disorders in Newborns and Children now require CCHD screening as part of the Uniform Screening Panel for newborns to include additional testing to detect and diagnose a wider range of illnesses. 3 Overall, the program showed a 33.4% and 21.4% decrease in early deaths from CCHD and unspecified cardiac diseases, respectively.…”

“…Children from disadvantaged backgrounds are at higher risk of death and morbidity from CHD as outlined in Table 2 . 6 , 12 , 19 , 80 , 86 Socioeconomic disparities in pediatric CHD outcomes are influenced by factors such as education, access to material resources, and maternal health. 86 …”