Study: Socioeconomic, other risk factors explain racial disparity in asthma readmissions

African-American children were more than twice as likely as white children to be readmitted to an urban children’s hospital for asthma between August 2010 and October 2011, with socioeconomic and other risk factors accounting for virtually all of the difference, according to a study published online today by JAMA Pediatrics. “African-American children significantly differed with respect to nearly every measured biologic, environmental, disease management, access, and socioeconomic hardship variable,” the authors said. “Socioeconomic hardship variables explained 53% of the observed disparity.” The study was part of the Greater Cincinnati Asthma Risks Study.