Mining the health disparities and minority health bibliome: A computational scoping review and gap analysis of 200,000+ articles

Without comprehensive examination of available literature on health
disparities and minority health (HDMH), the field is left vulnerable to
disproportionately focus on specific populations or conditions, curtailing
our ability to fully advance health equity. Using scalable open-source
methods, we conducted a computational scoping review of more than 200,000
articles to investigate major populations, conditions, and themes in the
literature as well as notable gaps. We also compared trends in studied
conditions to their relative prevalence in the general population using
insurance claims (42 million Americans). HDMH publications represent 1% of
articles in MEDLINE. Most studies are observational in nature, though
randomized trial reporting has increased five-fold in the last twenty
years. Half of all HDMH articles concentrate on only three disease groups
(cancer, mental health, endocrine/metabolic disorders), while hearing,
vision, and skin-related conditions are among the least well-represented
despite substantial prevalence. To support further investigation, we also
present HDMH Monitor, an interactive dashboard and repository generated
from the HDMH bibliome.