Black patients below the age of 60 with acute myeloid leukemia, a rare, sudden bone marrow cancer, have a 28 percent higher chance of dying when compared to their white counterparts. Credit: Jack Westerheide | Lantern File Photo
Black patients below the age of 60 with acute myeloid leukemia, a rare, sudden bone marrow cancer, have a 28 percent higher chance of dying when compared to their white counterparts, according to a study published Dec. 4 from researchers at the James Cancer Hospital and Solove Research Institute at Ohio State.
Dr. Ann-Kathrin Eisfeld, a hematologist and researcher at the cancer hospital, said even when provided the same socioeconomic resources, the study found Black patients are more likely to die of the cancer that causes rapid red blood cell loss, dizziness, severe infections, new bruises and bleeding. Since studies on the condition have primarily focused on white subjects, less is known about acute myeloid leukemia in Black patients.
About 20,000 Americans are diagnosed with AML each year, but Eisfeld said the majority of patients are 60 or older and have only a 5 percent chance of living longer than three years. Patients between 18 and 60 have less than a 50 percent survival rate after three years.
In addition to age, race could also impact a patient’s prognosis. In one group studied, white patients had about a 65 percent chance of living three years or longer, while Black patients in the same group had a 15 percent chance of living for the same amount of time, Eisfeld said.
When patients’ blood and bone marrow are tested for AML, they are compared to data generated from white people, which could present a problem if there are genetic differences in leukemia by race — which the study suggests, Eisfeld said.
“We just don’t acknowledge that there could be various special and important things that they have to look at as well. So this is really another sort of what I would almost call research racism,” Eisfeld said.
Dr. Bhavana Bhatnagar, a hematologist at the cancer hospital, said the results of the study bring up the question of whether the different rates are due to genetic differences by race or because of racism and other external factors in medical care potentially hindering Black patients.
When researchers looked at socioeconomic status, where people were living, race and age, they found race was the one factor that stood out in terms of survival disparities, Bhatnagar said.
“Part of our findings were to propose that the actual disease may behave differently in younger Black patients, and that their treatment may need to be altered or adjusted to account for that,” Bhatnagar said.
Doctors with a better knowledge of socioeconomic barriers to health care can better treat their patients with AML, Bhatnagar said. Doctors must also rethink the way the cancer is treated in Black patients in response to the results, though more research is required before proper treatment plans can be formed.
Both Eisfeld and Bhatnagar said more research needs to be done to identify the definitive differences in AML by race.
“What we want to do now is really take a lot of samples from just Black patients with AML and really kind of start from scratch,” Eisfeld said. “What we did for white [patients with] AML, or just for AML in general, 10 years ago. We want to start all over now and really look from scratch — a blank page — and say, ‘What are actually the changes we see here? And what is it we missed up until now?’”
