{"id":10559,"date":"2019-09-06T06:50:53","date_gmt":"2019-09-06T10:50:53","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.bu.edu\/federal\/?p=10559"},"modified":"2019-09-10T11:55:05","modified_gmt":"2019-09-10T15:55:05","slug":"your-race-may-factor-in-which-er-an-ambulance-takes-you-to","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/federal\/2019\/09\/06\/your-race-may-factor-in-which-er-an-ambulance-takes-you-to\/","title":{"rendered":"Your Race May Factor in Which ER an Ambulance Takes You To"},"content":{"rendered":"

BU researchers also find that, regardless of race, 40 percent of patients transported by EMS are not brought to the nearest hospital<\/h4>\n

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Researchers at Boston University School of Medicine have discovered large differences between the emergency department and hospital destinations of black and Hispanic patients transported by EMS in comparison with their white counterparts. Photo by Marco_Piunti\/iStock.<\/em><\/p>\n

Your race\u2014not which hospital is nearest\u2014may influence which emergency room you are transported to by emergency medical services (EMS).<\/p>\n

National guidelines require EMS to transport patients to the nearest suitable hospital. But to what extent this occurs and whether this varies based on the race or ethnicity of patients has remained unknown. Until now, there has been scant research on the destination patterns of EMS-transported patients to hospitals.<\/p>\n

In a first-of-its-kind study, researchers at the Boston University School of Medicine showed large differences between the EMS-transport destinations of black and Hispanic patients in comparison with their white counterparts. They also found that 40 percent of patients overall, regardless of race, were not taken to the nearest hospital. According to the researchers, these findings, published online in <\/a>JAMA Network<\/a>,<\/em> suggest that the difference in these transportation destinations may be motivated by factors other than proximity or time.<\/p>\n

Using national Medicare claims data, the study divided patients based on the zip code they lived in, and compared which emergency departments and hospitals non-Hispanic white, black, and Hispanic patients were brought to within the same zip code. The study also looked at how often black and Hispanic patients were transported to the destinations most frequently used for white patients.<\/p>\n

The results of the study showed sizable differences by race and ethnicity in which medical centers patients were brought to by EMS. The widest disparities were seen in larger urban areas with multiple hospitals and emergency departments within the vicinity. The study also found that black and Hispanic patients were more likely to be transported to a \u201csafety net\u201d hospital\u2014a type of medical center that by legal obligation or mission provides healthcare for individuals regardless of their insurance status\u2014compared to their white counterparts living in the same zip code.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is not a causal study, so we really don\u2019t know why we are seeing this pattern,\u201d says study corresponding author Amresh Hanchate<\/a>, a MED associate professor of medicine and a health economist at VA Boston Healthcare System. \u201cIt could be a benign phenomenon where people are being brought to the place that they\u2019ve asked to go, because that\u2019s where their regular doctor or cardiologist is located.\u201d<\/p>\n

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This research is a necessary first step in order to examine the effects ambulance diversion has on patient care and understanding the relationship between emergency utilization and healthcare disparities.<\/div>\n