Study: Minorities more likely to have needless vascular surgery

A study appearing in the journal Stroke points out yet another of the seemingly endless list of disparities in care for minorities. This time, it's research concluding that minorities are more likely to have needless surgeries to remove plaque from inside their carotid arteries--and worse, to have poorer results, researchers have concluded.

To draw these conclusions, researchers drew on data from 9,093 Medicare patients in New York who had had the procedure, 95 percent of whom were Caucasian, 2.5 percent African-American and 2.2 percent Hispanic.

When looked at 30 days post-surgery, 9.5 percent of Hispanic patients and 6.9 percent of African-Americans had died or suffered a stroke as a result of the carotid endarectomy. Meanwhile, only 3.8 percent of Caucasians died or had strokes.

The study also found that for Hispanics, the surgery was inappropriate in 17.6 percent of cases, for African-Americans, 13 percent of cases and for Caucasians, 7.9 percent.

To learn more about this study:
- read this UPI piece

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