Leveraging Social Determinants of Health to Enhance Recruitment of Underrepresented Populations in Clinical Trials

• Published in: Methodist DeBakey cardiovascular journal Vol. 20; no. 5; pp. 81 - 88
• Main Authors: King, Sara, Trabanino, Sophia, Azizi, Zahra, Rodriguez, Fatima
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: United States Ubiquity Press Ltd 05.11.2024; Houston Methodist DeBakey Heart & Vascular Center
• Subjects: Clinical trials; Clinical Trials as Topic; Computational linguistics; Health Services Accessibility; Health Status Disparities; Healthcare Disparities; Humans; Language processing; Medical research; Medicine, Experimental; Minority Groups; Natural language interfaces; Patient Selection; Product development; recruitment; Research Subjects; Review; social determinants; Social Determinants of Health; underrepresentation; Vulnerable Populations; United States; Maryland; social determinants; clinical trials; recruitment; underrepresentation
• ISSN: 1947-6108; 1947-6094; 1947-6108
• DOI: 10.14797/mdcvj.1447

Historically marginalized communities are disproportionately affected by cardiometabolic diseases yet are underrepresented in clinical trials that investigate needed interventions. This review investigates the barriers to equitable inclusion in clinical trials, identifying opportunities for improvement at the institutional, trial, community, and individual level. It proposes a social determinants-based approach that serves as a toolkit to target these barriers using structural, economic, community, healthcare access, and technology solutions, supporting constructive improvement in the clinical trial recruitment process.