(Press-News.org) New York, NY – April 1, 2025- A study published today in the American Journal of Gastroenterology reveals significant disparities in healthcare utilization among racial and ethnic groups with inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) in the United States. The research, funded by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), led by investigators from the University of Pennsylvania, the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, and the Crohn's & Colitis Foundation provides crucial insights into the challenges faced by underrepresented communities in accessing and utilizing IBD care. This is the first study to address racial and ethnic disparities in healthcare utilization for inflammatory bowel disease in a nationally representative sample across all age groups.
The full paper, “Association of Race and Ethnicity with Healthcare Utilization for Inflammatory Bowel Disease in the United States: A Retrospective Cohort Study” is available here.
Key findings from the study show that Black Americans with IBD over 65 had nearly 1.5 times higher use of emergency department services compared to their White counterparts. Among working-age adults, Asian Americans and Hispanic Americans had lower use of advanced therapies for IBD compared to White adults. Some of the findings were associated with household income, suggesting that race was a surrogate marker for access barriers in certain socioeconomic groups. This highlights that socioeconomic disparities can play a significant role in healthcare utilization patterns among patients with inflammatory bowel disease.
The study analyzed data from two national datasets, including Optum's Clinformatics® Data Mart Database and Medicare, covering 2016 to 2017. The researchers examined healthcare utilization patterns across different racial and ethnic groups, including Asian, Black, Hispanic, and White Americans with IBD, spanning various age groups from children to older adults. Hispanic children showed increased healthcare utilization for IBD compared to White children, though these results did not meet statistical significance.
"This comprehensive evaluation of healthcare utilization patterns across racial and ethnic groups is a critical step in understanding and addressing the disparities in IBD care," said Andrés Hurtado-Lorenzo, PhD, Senior Vice President of Translational Research and IBD Ventures at the Crohn's & Colitis Foundation and study co-author. "Everyone affected by these chronic, relapsing conditions deserves the opportunity to lead active, healthy lives. Our findings highlight the critical work needed to achieve health equity for all patients with inflammatory bowel disease.”
"Our findings confirm healthcare access challenges in the long-term management of inflammatory bowel disease in historically underserved racial and ethnic groups," said lead investigator Abraham Segura, MD, MD, MSCE, Instructor of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania. "This study provides crucial data to inform healthcare policy, resource allocation, and future research priorities in addressing health disparities in IBD care."
The study authors note that while this research provides valuable insights, further investigation is needed to identify and address patient, clinician, and healthcare system barriers to achieve health equity in the management of IBD.
The research was funded by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) through grant U01-DP006369.
About the Crohn’s & Colitis Foundation
The Crohn’s & Colitis Foundation is the leading nonprofit organization focused on both research and patient support for inflammatory bowel disease (IBD), with the mission of curing Crohn’s disease and ulcerative colitis and improving the quality of life for the millions of Americans living with IBD. The Foundation’s work is dramatically accelerating the research process, while also providing extensive educational and support resources for patients and their families, medical professionals, and the public.
END
Study reveals stark racial disparities in IBD care across the united states
Black Americans with IBD over 65 had higher emergency department use; Asian and Hispanic adults had lower use of advanced IBD therapies compared to white counterparts
2025-04-01
ELSE PRESS RELEASES FROM THIS DATE:
Break the sedentary cycle: National Walking Day can kickstart healthier routines
2025-04-01
DALLAS, April 1, 2025 — Sedentary behavior has become a national health crisis, with 1 in 4 U.S. adults sitting for more than eight hours a day, increasing their risk for heart disease, stroke, and mental health challenges, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. To help people move more, the American Heart Association, a global force changing the future of health of all, invites communities nationwide to walk together on Wednesday, April 2.
Adopting healthier routines doesn’t have to be intimidating or overwhelming according to Eduardo Sanchez MD, MPH, FAHA, the ...
Researchers develop new way to match young cancer patients with the right drugs
2025-04-01
A pan-Canadian team has developed a new way to quickly find personalized treatments for young cancer patients, by growing their tumours in chicken eggs and analyzing their proteins.
The team, led by researchers from the University of British Columbia and BC Children’s Hospital Research Institute, is the first in Canada to combine these two techniques to identify and test a drug for a young patient's tumour in time for their treatment.
Their success in finding a new drug for the patient, described today in EMBO Molecular Medicine, shows how the study of proteins, known as proteomics, ...
New 3D technology paves way for next-generation eye-tracking
2025-04-01
Eye tracking plays a critical role in the latest virtual and augmented reality headsets and is an important technology in the entertainment industry, scientific research, medical and behavioral sciences, automotive driving assistance and industrial engineering. Tracking the movements of the human eye with high accuracy, however, is a daunting challenge.
Researchers at the University of Arizona Wyant College of Optical Sciences have now demonstrated an innovative approach that could revolutionize eye-tracking ...
Diagnosing a dud may lead to a better battery
2025-04-01
It’s (going to be) electric.
But how soon? How quickly our society can maximize the benefit of electrification hinges on finding cheaper, higher performance batteries — a reality closer to hand through new research from Virginia Tech.
A team of chemists led by Feng Lin and Louis Madsen found a way to see into battery interfaces, which are tight, tricky spots buried deep inside the cell. The research findings were published on April 1 in the journal Nature Nanotechnology.
“There are major, longstanding challenges at the interfaces,” ...
We know nanoplastics are a threat—this new tool can help us figure out just how bad they are
2025-04-01
April 1, 2025
AMHERST, Mass. – While the threat that microplastics pose to human and ecological health has been richly documented and is well known, nanoplastics, which are smaller than one micrometer (1/50th the thickness of an average human hair), are far more reactive, far more mobile and vastly more capable of crossing biological membranes. Yet, because they are so tiny and so mobile, researchers don’t yet have an accurate understanding of just how toxic these particles are. The first step to understanding the toxicology of nanoplastics is to build a reliable, ...
Mpox could become a serious global threat, scientists warn
2025-04-01
Mpox has the potential to become a significant global health threat if taken too lightly, according to scientists at the University of Surrey.
In a letter published in Nature Medicine, researchers highlight how mpox – traditionally spread from animals to humans – is now showing clear signs of sustained human-to-human transmission.
Mpox is a viral infection caused by a virus that belongs to the same family as smallpox. The virus can cause a painful rash, fever, and swollen glands and, in some cases, lead to more serious illness. Mpox usually spreads through ...
Combination immunotherapy shrank a variety of metastatic gastrointestinal cancers
2025-04-01
A new form of tumor infiltrating lymphocyte (TIL) therapy, a form of personalized cancer immunotherapy, dramatically improved the treatment’s effectiveness in patients with metastatic gastrointestinal cancers, according to results of a clinical trial led by researchers at the National Institutes of Health (NIH). The findings, published April 1, 2025 in Nature Medicine, offer hope that this therapy could be used to treat a variety of solid tumors, which has so far eluded researchers developing cell-based ...
Newborn warty birch caterpillars defend the world’s smallest territory
2025-04-01
Real estate is precious. Some creatures defend territories extending over several kilometres, but when Jayne Yack (Carleton University, Canada) encountered miniature newborn warty birch caterpillars (Falcaria bilineata) she wondered if she might have discovered one of the world’s smallest, and youngest, territorial critters. ‘We had noticed that tiny warty birch caterpillars produced vibrations’, says Yack, who first encountered the feisty little creatures in 2008. She also noticed that the tiny caterpillars – 1 to 2 mm long – reside in solitude on birch leaves, making her speculate whether they ...
Exposure to air pollution in childhood is associated with reduced brain connectivity
2025-04-01
A new study led by the Barcelona Institute for Global Health (ISGlobal), a centre supported by the "la Caixa" Foundation, has found that children exposed to higher levels of air pollution in early and mid childhood have weaker connections between key brain regions. The findings, published in Environment International, highlight the potential impact of early exposure to air pollution on brain development.
The research showed reduced functional connectivity within and between certain cortical and subcortical brain networks. These networks are systems of interconnected brain structures that work together to perform different cognitive functions, such as thinking, perceiving and controlling ...
Researchers develop test using machine learning to help predict immunotherapy response in lymphoma patients
2025-04-01
LOS ANGELES — Researchers with City of Hope, one of the largest and most advanced cancer research and treatment organizations in the United States, with its National Medical Center in Los Angeles ranked among the nation’s top 5 cancer centers by U.S. News & World Report, and MSK have created a tool that uses machine learning to assess a non-Hodgkin lymphoma (NHL) patient’s likely response to chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) T cell therapy before starting the treatment, according to study results published today in Nature Medicine.
CAR T cell therapy ...
LAST 30 PRESS RELEASES:
AI effectively predicts dementia risk in American Indian/Alaska Native elders
First guideline on newborn screening for cystic fibrosis calls for changes in practice to improve outcomes
Existing international law can help secure peace and security in outer space, study shows
Pinning down the process of West Nile virus transmission
UTA-backed research tackles health challenges across ages
In pancreatic cancer, a race against time
Targeting FGFR2 may prevent or delay some KRAS-mutated pancreatic cancers
Melodies of musical ‘starquakes’ shed new light on how our galaxy formed
Protective radar for bacteria
Increased utilization of overtime and agency nurses and patient safety
Spending on glucagon-like peptide-1 receptor agonists among US adults
Early-life ozone exposure and asthma and wheeze in children
Early Earth's first crust composition discovery rewrites geological timeline
Dark diversity reveals global impoverishment of natural vegetation
Study finds rates of breast and colorectal cancer screening nearly four-fold higher than lung cancer screening among those eligible
Sound frequencies of stars sing of our galaxy’s past and future
Tomato plants delay shoot meristem maturation to achieve heat-stress resilience
KTU researchers explore using soil for heat storage
Sociology leaders rally in support of academia, urge protection of free inquiry and research
Exploring AI’s role in decarbonizing the chemical industry: A multi-scale perspective
A review on structured magnetic soft robots: Locomotion innovation driven by structural engineering
NCCN 2025 Annual Conference illustrates the critical impact of cancer research on improving lives
NSD2 gene drives cancer cell identity in multiple myeloma
From octopus intelligence to smart artificial blood vessels: 2025 Schmidt Science Fellows to break new ground with interdisciplinary research
Experts challenge aspirin guidelines based on their undue reliance on a flawed trial
McGill discovery sheds new light on autism, intellectual disabilities
Cellular changes occur even below the hexavalent chromium limit
Study suggests a new way to curb social media’s body image toll
Plant doctor: An AI system that watches over urban trees without touching a leaf
Study tracks chromium chemistry in irradiated molten salts
[Press-News.org] Study reveals stark racial disparities in IBD care across the united statesBlack Americans with IBD over 65 had higher emergency department use; Asian and Hispanic adults had lower use of advanced IBD therapies compared to white counterparts