Black patients were less likely to receive the most effective treatment for early stage non-small cell lung cancer, surgery to remove a portion of lung, during each of the years from 2004 to 2015 in the United States.
However, the utilization of surgery increased over this time for both white and Black patients, with the rate of increase in Black patients faster than in white patients.
“This indicates that some work is being done to close the disparity in the utilization of surgery in Black patients,” says researcher Olugbenga Okusanya of the Sidney Kimmel Cancer Center – Jefferson Health in Philadelphia.
See “Racial Disparities in Treatment for Common Lung Cancer Persist Despite Gains” on the Thomas Jefferson University Hospitals website (October 29, 2020)
