Each day, 356 people across the US lose their battle with lung cancer. What’s more, another person is told they have lung cancer nearly every two and a half minutes, according to the American Lung Association.

Described as the “most lethal solid organ malignancy in the United States” by researchers writing in an article in the Journal of Thoracic Disease,

Evans III N, Grenda T, Alvarez NH, et al. Narrative review of socioeconomic and racial disparities in the treatment of early stage lung cancer. Journal of Thoracic Disease. 2021;13(6).

lung cancer doesn’t necessarily discriminate based on race.

 

Physicians can help to mitigate racial disparities in lung cancer by implementing non-discriminatory systems and strategies in the exam room.

 

People of color have higher lung cancer mortality

 

According to a 2022 report fromthe American Lung Association, the national survival rate for Americans with lung cancer rose from 21% to 25% in the last 5 years. For communities of color, however, that statistic remains at 20%.

Lung Cancer Key Findings. American Lung Association. November 17, 2022.

 

This may be a result of the differences in care that communities of color tend to receive.

“Patients of color, particularly Black patients, tend to have less access to care, less timely follow-up when there’s an abnormal finding, and later stages of diagnosis,” epidemiologist Louise Henderson, PhD, told Kaiser Health News (KHN).

Newsome M. Racial Disparities in Lung Cancer Start With Research. Kaiser Health News. November 30, 2022.

 

 

The issue of later-stage diagnosis is particularly poignant, since early diagnosis is crucial to survival in many cases.

This lack of representation of Blacks in clinical studies may very well be one reason why Black patients deal with delayed disease detection and higher mortality rates, experts say.

All in all, people of color—especially Black people—experience worse health outcomes related to lung cancer. Fortunately, efforts are underway to address these disparities.

 

Health benefits of anti-racisim strategies

 

Emerging research points to the potential for antiracism strategies to change the observed disparities.

Specifically, the researchers analyzed the proportion of patients who received surgery within 8 weeks of diagnosis.

The intervention took place at five cancer centers that participated in a study called Accountability for Cancer Care through Undoing Racism and Equity (ACCURE), an antiracism prospective pragmatic trial. A total of 2,363 patients with stage I and II non-small-cell lung cancer participated.

The intervention included three separate components. First, researchers used a real-time warning system to identify unmet care milestones. Second, they gathered race-specific feedback on lung cancer treatment rates. Finally, they implemented patient navigation.

The results were optimistic: 87.1% of Black patients and 85.4% of White patients in the intervention group underwent surgery within 8 weeks of getting their diagnosis. In the retrospective control group, only 58.7% of Black patients and 75% of White patients had the same outcome.

Antiracist interventions, the authors concluded, therefore created the opportunity for Black and White patients to get timelier surgery while effectively reducing the racial disparity in lung cancer treatment.

Physicians may take cues from ACCURE’s protocols in order to better care for patients of color with lung cancer, creating a more equitable landscape of care for all.