Toward eliminating health disparities in PA practice: Sustaining change.

Abstract

Health disparities remain persistent in medicine. This study, conducted via a random chart review, evaluated the professional practices of a national cohort of clinically practicing PAs who participated in a previous quality improvement (QI) intervention addressing fi ve domains in which health disparities are known to exist: race/ethnicity, sexual ori-entation/gender identity (SOGI), literacy/numeracy, phys-ical/sensory/cognitive disabilities, and access issues (economic/geographic). Published statistical analyses on a paired-samples pre-post intervention revealed signifi cant improvements in participant’s practices after 30 days with medium- to large-sized effects in four of the fi ve domains. This study examined the previously studied cohort’s professional practices at 1 to 3 years postintervention. and economic/geographic access A repeated-measures analysis of variance was conducted to determine whether professional practice improvements were sustained over time and to what degree at 1 to 3 years from preintervention as well as 30-day postintervention, contrasted with the previously published preintervention to 30-day postintervention fi ndings, and P values reported for each.