Congratulations to Dr. Daphne Lew, Assistant Professor of Biostatistics, along with Dr. Alfred Kim, an Associate Professor in WashU Medicine’s Division of Rheumatology for being co-senior authors on an exciting publication in ACR Open Rheumatology on patient-reported social risk factor (SRF) screening among rheumatology outpatients.
The researchers aimed to determine the feasibility of implementing routine SRF screening tools in clinical practice and to understand the distribution of SRFs among rheumatology outpatients. Dr. Lew led the development of the novel screening tool used in this study, which allows for patient-reported responses to the SRF screener that are automatically integrated into the electronic health record. While sociodemographic factors such as race, ethnicity, and socioeconomic status are known to be correlated with disease prevalence and outcomes, key findings from this study indicate that integrating SRF screenings into clinical workflows is feasible and has the potential to enhance patient-centered care and improve health equity.
Future efforts will focus on developing interventions tailored to SRFs and educating clinicians about utilizing SRF data in electronic health records. This study lays the groundwork for more holistic approaches in managing autoimmune diseases like lupus and rheumatoid arthritis.