Disparities in outcomes from chronic disease

doi:10.1136/bmj.323.7319.950

BMJ 2001;323:950 ( 27 October )

Editorials

Disparities in outcomes from chronic disease

Impaired patient-physician partnerships may be an important cause in minorities

Papers pp 962, 967

The first 150 words of the full text of this article appear below.

Recent developments in basic biomedical research offer the great promise that we will increasingly understand factors thatunderlie risk and expression of disease and, with further advancesin genetic engineering, translate this knowledge into highly individualisedtreatments to reduce the burden from both acute and chronic diseases.Two studies in this issue, however, remind us that this idealisedworld of risk prediction and tailored treatments will have tosucceed in the real world of cultural and ethnic diversity andimbalances in socioeconomicstatus.

Chalmers et al (p 967) report findings from a cohort study examining the relations between socioeconomic status and chronicdisease and mortality in Scotland.¹ Consistent with studiesin other patient populations, ² ³ individuals in the lowestsocioeconomic quintile were at higher risk of several major diseasesand were likely to die at a younger age than those in the highestquintile. Similar gradients in health with increasing . . . [Full text of this article]

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