Black MS patients have higher rate of disability than white counterparts

SEATTLE — Black patients with MS demonstrated a higher rate of disability throughout their disease course compared with white MS patients, according to a presenter at the 2022 American Academy of Neurology annual meeting.

“As we looked at multiple studies, [they] showed [Black] patients had worse disease outcomes than [white] patients, so our main goal was to see if that held true in our own [MS] population,” Elissa Dykes, a medical student at the University of Alabama, Birmingham, said during the presentation.

Dykes and colleagues explored potential race-based health disparities among the MS patient population at UAB hospital by conducting a retrospective chart-review study. They reviewed electronic health records of 452 patients (304 white, 148 Black), which included information on patient demographics, duration of disease, disability score, onset of disease and treatment.

Results showed that Black patients at UAB hospital had a higher rate of disability than their white counterparts. However, unlike data from other cohorts, the Black cohort at UAB were younger at disease onset (average age, 33 years) compared with white patients (average age, 38 years).

In addition, Dykes and colleagues found that at both initial and follow-up visits, Black MS patients required more ambulatory assistance and had a higher Expanded Disability Status Score (EDSS) than their white counterparts.

“At initial presentation, more [Black individuals] were hospitalized than [white], and when controlling for duration of follow-up, [Black patients] were more likely to have an increasing EDSS score indicating worsening disability,” Dykes said.