Patients’ Diversity Is Often Discounted
When UCLA researchers reviewed the best available studies of psychiatric drugs for depression, bipolar disorder, schizophrenia and attention deficit disorder, they found that the trials had involved 9,327 patients over the years. When the team looked to see how many patients were Native Americans, the answer was . . .
Zero.
“I don’t know of a single trial in the last 10 to 15 years that has been published regarding the efficacy of a pharmacological agent in treating a serious mental disorder in American Indians,” said Spero Manson, a psychiatrist who heads the American Indian and Alaska Native Programs at the University of Colorado Health Sciences Center in Aurora. “It is stunning.”
It truly is stunning, but not all that surprising when you take into consideration the sizes of the drug trials necessary to garner FDA’s approval. The large the trial size, the more likely you’ll find significant clinical effects (because if you don’t show those, you won’t make it past the FDA). Facts are, minority populations are often harder to recruit and most universities don’t always have the relationship needed with a minority community to induce them to be included in drug trials.
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Last reviewed: By John M. Grohol, Psy.D. on 27 Jun 2005
