New research published in Frontiers in Public Health shows racial disparities in COVID-19 hospitalization lengths of stay and access to treatments early in the pandemic.
BELLEVUE, Wash. – January 19, 2023 – Today Truveta announced new COVID-19 health equity research published in Frontiers in Public Health using de-identified patient data from Truveta Studio. Published in the section on Life-Course Epidemiology and Social Inequalities in Health in Frontiers in Public Health, the new research identified racial disparities in treatment and hospitalization early in the coronavirus pandemic, with patient care across race and ethnicity reaching parity in the later COVID waves.
This Truveta research found that Black individuals were treated with remdesivir at a significantly lower rate (12%) than white individuals during the December 2020 wave, after adjustment for demographic and comorbidity factors. Statistically significant trends were not observed during either the Delta or Omicron waves.
After adjustment for demographic factors and comorbidities, Truveta also found that Black individuals had a significantly longer length of stay than white individuals at 5%, 16%, and 18% for the Wild, December 2020, and Delta waves respectively. There were no significant differences for Omicron.
“The COVID-19 pandemic has affected underrepresented and minoritized communities in a variety of ways,” said Charlotte Baker, DrPH, MPH, CPH, director of epidemiology at Truveta. “This study is very important to show that not only are marginalized communities at a greater risk for COVID-19, but they were less likely to get potentially life-saving treatment. The closing of the gap we saw undoubtedly could have been due to actions by health systems to be conscious of removing disparities, but there is still much more work to be done. We are excited to stay at the forefront.”
Power of timely, representative data to speed time to insight
Researchers face frustrating months-long delays to their work — from assessing the feasibility of generating a representative population for analysis, to the time to create a secure data analytics infrastructure. Fragmented and limited tools slow research, drive-up costs, and limit transparency and trust in study conclusions.
Truveta Studio brings together unprecedented health data and analytics for researchers to study patient care and outcomes with any condition, drug, or medical device. Truveta Studio is the first integrated solution that combines data and analytics to accelerate learning in real time. No other system has been designed to study patient care and outcomes at this scale. Both the completeness of the data and the speed of accessing it cut the typical waiting and research time down from months to days.
“This was an especially meaningful project for us because we were able to use the power of Truveta Studio to contribute to the study of health inequality in COVID treatment,” said Nick Stucky, MD, PhD, vice president of Research at Truveta and practicing infectious disease physician and researcher at Providence Portland Medical Center. “This pandemic has exposed the vulnerabilities of our systems and highlighted longstanding inequalities in health and healthcare in this country. Our hope is that this study will further highlight where improvement is possible and what those improvements might be.”
You can read the full study in Frontiers in Public Health and in the Truveta Research blog. You can learn more about Truveta Studio on Truveta.com.
About Truveta
Truveta was formed and governed by US health systems with a shared vision of saving lives with data. Truveta now offers the world’s first health data and analytics solution to study patient care and outcomes. To learn more, please follow us on LinkedIn and visit truveta.com.
About Truveta’s Members
Truveta’s 25 members provide 16% of patient care in the United States in more than 20,000 clinics and 700 hospitals. De-identified data from this care is provided to Truveta daily. Truveta membership includes Providence, Advocate Aurora Health, Trinity Health, Tenet Healthcare, Northwell Health, AdventHealth, Baptist Health of Northeast Florida, Baylor Scott & White Health, Bon Secours Mercy Health, Centura Health, CommonSpirit Health, Hawaii Pacific Health, Henry Ford Health System, HonorHealth, MedStar Health, Memorial Hermann Health System, MetroHealth, Novant Health, Ochsner Health, Saint Luke’s Health System, Sentara Healthcare, Texas Health Resources, UnityPoint Health, Virtua Health, and WellSpan Health.