In a scientific statement issued by the American Heart Association and published in Circulation, Daniel Addison, MD, and colleagues defined the current state of evidence relating to disparities in cardio-oncology and proposed an integrated approach to mitigate disparities in the routine
clinical setting. Women seem to have higher rates of immune checkpoint inhibitor-related toxicities, with some unique cardiotoxic mechanisms. The risk for cardiotoxicity and cardiovascular mortality with anticancer (targeted, immune, hormone) therapies is increased up to three-fold for Black patients. Increased cardiotoxic risk is also seen in other racial and ethnic minority groups. Among Black patients, hypertension and other cardiovascular disease risk factors are disproportionately increased with chemotherapy. Because many trials do not represent diverse populations well, clinical trial data for cardiotoxic risk assessment should be interpreted cautiuosly, the study authors needed
