Racial Disparities in Outpatient Physical Therapy Use After Hip Fracture: A Retrospective Cohort Study.
Roy Film, Julie Fritz, Tiffany Adams and 3 others
PMID 39602204WHAT IT FOUND
Black Medicare beneficiaries were much less likely to receive outpatient PT after hip fracture than White beneficiaries.
This gap remained even after accounting for age, sex, medical complexity, and social factors. Black patients who did start therapy also received fewer visits.
Key findings
01Black beneficiaries had 50% lower odds of receiving outpatient PT compared to White beneficiaries in unadjusted analyses.
02The disparity in outpatient PT use persisted after adjusting for demographics, medical complexity, and social determinants of health.
03Among those who received an initial evaluation, Black beneficiaries received fewer PT sessions on average than White beneficiaries.
STILL TO COME
How it was doneWhat they foundWhat it means for PTs
Read the rest of this summary
You get three full summaries a month, free, and we do not ask for a card. Search, the TL;DRs and your library stay unlimited either way.
What it does not show
The study used claims data, so it could not identify patients who were referred to outpatient PT but never attended. Home health PT was excluded, so the findings do not account for therapy received in that setting. The study could not assess disparities for racial groups other than Black and White due to small sample sizes. As a retrospective analysis, unmeasured confounders such as patient preference or caregiver support may have influenced the results. Findings may not generalize outside the US Medicare system.
Declared interests
The study was supported by the National Institutes of Health. No other conflicts of interest were reported in the provided text.
The easy way to misread this
Do not assume the disparity is fully explained by the covariates adjusted for in the model. The authors state that the gap persisted after these adjustments, suggesting other unmeasured factors like structural racism or patient preference may be driving the difference.