In U.S. studies of dermatologic clinical trials, reporting of race/ethnicity increased from 2010-2015 to 2015-2020, but inclusion of representative patient populations is still inadequate, according to a review published online Jan. 26 in JAMA Dermatology .

Vivien Chen, from the University of Miami Miller School of Medicine, and colleagues conducted a systematic literature review to characterize the diversity of participants in dermatologic clinical trials conducted in the United States and published between 2015 and 2020 and compared findings for trials published from 2010 to 2015. The analyses included 392 randomized clinical trials.

The researchers found that compared with the period of 2010 to 2015, the reporting rate for race and ethnicity increased in U.S. studies from 59.8 to 71.9 percent in 2015 to 2020. There was no change observed in the proportion of articles including at least 20 percent non-White representation, which was stable at 38.1 percent (37 of 97 trials in 2010 to 2015 and 53 of 139 trials in 2015 to 2020). The least diversity was seen among psoriasis studies, with 12.1 and 25.9 percent of studies reporting at least 20 percent non-White participants and at least 45 percent female participants, respectively.

"While reporting of racial and ethnic data has become more transparent from the 2010-2015 period to the 2015-2020 period, inclusion of representative patient populations (particularly in psoriasis studies) has not statistically significantly changed," the authors write.

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