Within-Physician Differences in Patient Sharing Between Primary Care Physicians and Cardiologists Who Treat White and Black Patients With Heart Disease.

ABSTRACT:

Background

Black-White disparities in heart disease treatment may be attributable to differences in physician referral networks. We mapped physician networks for Medicare patients and examined within-physician Black-White differences in patient sharing between primary care physicians and cardiologists.

Methods and results

Using Medicare fee-for-service files for 2016 to 2017, we identified a cohort of Black and White patients with heart disease and the primary care physicians and cardiologists treating them. To ensure the robustness of within-physician comparisons, we restricted the sample to regional health care markets (ie, hospital referral regions) with at least 10 physicians sharing ≥3 Black and White patients. We used claims to construct 2 race-specific physician netwo

SUBMITTER: Matthews LJ 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC10727292 | biostudies-literature | 2023 Nov

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature