Why ethnic minorities have higher hospital survival rates than others

Reported by Susan Aldridge, PhD, medical journalist

There may be a simple explanation for the higher hospital survival rates of African-Americans.
Ethnic origin affects many health related factors. For instance, it has been noted that African-Americans appear more likely to survive a hospital stay than non-Hispanic whites. A team at the University of California, San Francisco, has been looking at why there is this ethnic imbalance, from studying a group of over 300,000 patients.

They learned that 25,000 or so of the group had Do Not Resuscitate (DNR) orders, which is an expression of the patient's wish not to prolong treatment if they are terminally ill. White people were more likely to have a DNR than African-Americans. When this was factored into survival data, it was found that any ethnic differences disappeared. The reasons why African-Americans are less likely to have a DNR are not known and must be the subject of further study.

Source
American Journal of Medicine March 2005 Volume 118 Number 4