At issue is a once widely used test that overestimated how well Black people’s kidneys were functioning, making them look healthier than they really were — all because of an automated formula that calculated results for Black and non-Black patients differently. That race-based equation could delay diagnosis of organ failure and evaluation for a transplant, exacerbating other disparities that already make Black patients more at risk of needing a new kidney but less likely to get one.

A few years ago, the National Kidney Foundation and American Society of Nephrology prodded laboratories to switch to race-free equations in calculating kidney function. Then the U.S. organ transplant network ordered hospitals to use only race-neutral test results in adding new patients to the kidney waiting list.

Dr. Martha Pavlakis (of Boston’s Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center and former chair of the network’s kidney committee) calls what happened next an attempt at restorative justice: The transplant network gave hospitals a year to uncover which Black kidney candidates could have qualified for a new kidney sooner if not for the race-based test — and adjust their waiting time to make up for it. That lookback continues for each newly listed Black patient to see if they, too, should have been referred sooner.

  • Melkath@kbin.social
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    7 months ago

    Okay, I don’t in any way know the biological science involved, but I do know a few years back, I was reading all over the place how American medicine was aimed at white people, and not factoring for different biological factors for black people was racist and was killing black people.

    Now I am reading an article that testing factoring for the biological differences of black people is racist and was killing black people.

    It’s just seems like a no-win situation…