NYC Health + Hospitals will no longer perform two common diagnostic tests that use race-based calculations, the New York City-based health system said May 17.
The health system will stop adjusting for race in a formula commonly used to measure kidney function. Instead, NYC Health + Hospitals will calculate the measure — known as glomerular filtration rate — based solely on a patient's creatine levels, age and sex.
The health system will also stop using a clinical risk calculation for vaginal birth after Cesarean-section. The calculation was created in 2007 and includes race as a risk factor alongside age, body mass index and clinical history of delivery.
The changes are part of the system's new "medical eracism" initiative, which aims to eliminate race-based assessments used for medical decisions that are based on biased assumptions and could hinder care quality for patients of color.
“Race is not a biological determinant, but a social construct," NYC Health + Hospitals CMO Machelle Allen, MD, said in a news release. "These calculations were based on racialized assumptions about biology that date back to slavery and the belief that somehow the bodies of African descendants were different from others."
Quality, safety and equity leaders at the health system are leading the initiative and will work to identify additional race-based assessments to recommend for elimination.