Far beyond mere academic interest, the collection of race and ethnicity data is an important way to identify and ultimately address disparities in access to treatment and inequalities in health care provision. The extent to which race and ethnicity, a multifaceted concept, is reported in the medical literature is extremely variable, according to an article published in the March 2020 issue of the Journal of Clinical Epidemiology. Investigators sought to determine objectively the quality of reporting of race and ethnicity in original medical research papers. A retrospective bibliometric analysis was used. Two independent investigators analyzed original articles investigating race and ethnicity, published between 2007 and 2018, in the 10 top-ranking academic journals in each of the following categories: general medicine, surgery, and oncology.
Among 995 original articles reporting race and ethnicity in the top 10 ranking medical academic journals, only 4.52% provided a formal definition of race and ethnicity and only 10.25% described the method used to classify individuals as to race and ethnicity. Eighty-one different race and ethnicity classifications were identified, but they often were imprecise and open to interpretation. A reasonable question is what, if anything, does this information add to what already is known? The adherence of leading medical academic journals to International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE) and also the American Medical Association (AMA) Manual of Style guidelines was poor (still poor when considering previous studies). Pertinent questions are what is the implication and what should change now? The investigators conclude that there is significant room for improvement in the collection, reporting, and publishing of data describing ethnicity and race. Given that many national and international agencies, including the National Institutes of Health, require extensive data sets to identify and ultimately prevent health disparities, the lack of adequate reporting of race and ethnicity in the medical literature presents a significant and clinically relevant problem.
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