Sex and Gender Variables in Data Set Creation and Data Cleaning for Inclusive and Accurate Reproductive Health Research and Quality Improvement.
Julia C Phillippi, Andrew Wiese, Sarah F Loch and 4 others
PMID 39350504WHAT IT FOUND
A male sex/gender field did not rule out that the patient had given birth.
All 8 such records were valid birthing cases; 2 had changed gender after birth. Do not use that field alone to exclude birthing parents from perinatal QI or research.
Key findings
01The audit found 8 birthing parents with a male sex and gender variable, and all 8 were valid cases rather than mistaken identifications.
02Six charts used only female terms, and two charts described female gender at birth then male gender later.
03Excluding records with male sex from perinatal data sets would have removed real birthing parents from the target population.
STILL TO COME
How it was doneWhat they foundWhat it means for RNs
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 audit was done at one health system, so it may not apply to other EHR systems. The number of charts with a male sex and gender variable was small. It reviewed only records already coded male, not all birthing individuals. The review relied on EHR notes and demographic fields rather than direct patient assessment.
Declared interests
The authors declared no conflicts of interest. The article is listed as NIH extramural research support.
The easy way to misread this
Do not conclude that 8 records among 47,635 birthing individuals means the problem is too small to matter. All 8 were valid birthing parents, so using the male sex and gender field as an exclusion criterion would have removed real target patients.