The University of Alabama at Birmingham Department of Neurosurgery Professor Brandon Rocque, M.D., M.S., presented at the 2023 Joint Pediatric Section Annual Meeting in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, on Friday, Dec. 1, 2023. Rocque’s study, “Racial Disparities in Hydrocephalus Mortality and Shunt Revision: A Study from the Hydrocephalus Clinical Research Network,” assessed the largest comprehensive database of children with hydrocephalus, provided by the Hydrocephalus Clinical Research Network (HCRN), as it relates to literature suggesting that Black and Hispanic pediatric hydrocephalus patients may have a higher risk of mortality compared to patients of other races.
In addition to the literature, a separate study run by UAB researchers using a national registry of children with spina bifida found a lower rate of shunt revision surgery among minority children compared to white children.
In Rocque’s study, researchers analyzed mortality and lifetime shunt revision surgeries to assess for racial disparities, finding that there is a slightly higher mortality and slightly lower shunt revision rates in Hispanic children, but no difference between white and Black children.
The HCRN consists of 14 hospitals in North America, with UAB, one of the four original members, consistently remaining one of the largest research contributors.
Future research is planned to investigate the causes of this disparity.