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Race and ethnicity are risk factors in many diseases. Examples include, but are not limited to, cystic fibrosis and spinal muscular atrophy. There is also an epidemiological purpose of collecting this information. It is important to know if some disease is affecting some races or some ethnicities disproportionately. This is how it was found out that race or ...

There's a myriad of adjustments that can improve patients' treatment if it's race-informed. As a very small but characteristic example, the 2021 European Society of Cardiology Guidelines for Heart Failure recommend considering hydralazine and isosorbide dinitrate only for patients self-identifying as Black. Reference: McDonagh TA et al. 2021 ESC Guidelines ...

Here are some random examples: Ashkenazi Jewish Genetic Diseases Bloom syndrome. Canavan disease. Cystic fibrosis. Th Familial dysautonomia (FD). Fanconi anemia. Gaucher disease. Mucolipidosis IV. Niemann-Pick disease (type A). Tay-Sachs disease. Torsion dystonia. Sephardi and Mizrahi Jews diseases Oculocutaneous albinism Ataxia telangiectasia Creutzfeldt–...

On a scale from sledgehammer to scalpel, race, as recorded in medical data is closer to sledgehammer in terms of granularity, but hey, sometimes we need sledgehammers (e.g. for broad epidemiological surveys). In terms of precision medicine, the promised dream is of identification of genetic idiosyncrasies guiding treatment - for which race is a very rough ...

When you immigrate to the United States (as I did), one of the first things you notice is that you get asked about your race all the time. Want a loan from your bank, your race is recorded (if you decide not to disclose your race, the bank officer will take a best guess - really) https://www.fdic.gov/resources/bankers/fair-lending/. Apply to university, ...

The answer to your question can come from many angles. I do not have clinical experience, but I do have regulatory reporting experience. In the United States, the CDC runs a program called "Vaccines for Children". I've had to run reports on demographics of patients many times, specifically for the following VFC criteria located at the link below. ...

In addition to all the fine answers, there are even more clinical reasons for including race in your chart. For one, clinical lab norms and calculations based on the clinical lab values can differ by race. For example, the calculation for Glomerular Filtration Rate, an important indicator of renal function, uses a different formula for African American ...