The study was done by researchers of the University of Texas School of Public Health led by Dale Hardy, Ph.D. They studied 83,101 patients aged 65 and older, including 75,141 whites (90.4 percent) and 7,960 blacks (9.6 percent) who were diagnosed between 1991 and 2002.

 

For patients with early lung cancer, the researchers found that, blacks were 37 percent less likely than whites to receive recommended surgery and 42 percent less likely to receive recommended chemotherapy. For patients with later stage of the disease, blacks were 57 percent less likely to receive recommended chemotherapy than whites.

 

The study also found that older patients, women and those with lower incomes also experienced disparities in treatment.

 

“Efforts should focus on the appropriate quality treatment and educating blacks on the value of having these treatments to reduce these disparities in receipt of treatment for non-small cell lung cancer,” the researchers wrote in their study. Only this way, black lung cancer patients will experience similar survival rates and quality of life as white patients.