• Posted June 10, 2025

Racial Disparities Driving Emergency Surgery Costs

TUESDAY, June 10, 2025 (HealthDay News) — Emergency surgeries are gnawing away at U.S. health care spending, with racial disparities fueling the bill, a new study says.

Emergency surgeries cost about 33% more than planned procedures, averaging $13,645 more per patient, researchers write.

And costs for these emergency procedures are even higher among Americans of color, results show.

Emergency surgeries are needed when medical problems develop into health crises due to a lack of regular medical care, researchers wrote.

“These numbers reflect real individuals and families who face significant financial and health challenges due to unequal access to preventive care, a disparity that has previously been shown to be driven by racial inequities in healthcare," lead researcher Dr. Saad Mallick, a fellow at the Center for Advanced Surgical & Interventional Technology at UCLA, said in a news release.

Converting just 10% of America’s emergency procedures to planned surgeries could save $1.8 billion a year, researchers report in the June issue of the journal Surgery Open Science.

For the study, researchers analyzed data for more than 3 million people who underwent one of three major surgical procedures between 2011 and 2020 — abdominal aortic aneurysm repair, heart bypass surgery and colon cancer tumor removal.

When patients have access to regular screening and preventive care, these procedures often can be scheduled in advance, researchers said.

But researchers found that the percentage of these surgeries that are needed on an emergency basis rose during the past decade, rising to nearly 45% from just over 39%.

Black patients face 19% higher costs for emergency surgery than white patients, $15,552 versus $13,086, researchers found.

Likewise, Asian/Pacific Islander patients have 29% higher costs ($16,887) and Hispanic patients 11% higher ($14,525).

Emergency surgeries also were associated with higher rates of death, complications and longer hospital stays, results show.

"What's particularly striking is that these are largely preventable costs — we know how to screen for aneurysms, heart disease and colorectal cancer,” Mallick said.

“The question is whether we have the determination to ensure all Americans have equal access to these essential services,” Mallick continued. “Every emergency surgery that could have been prevented underscores the potential to improve patient outcomes and the challenges they face, while also revealing a gap in the healthcare system."

More information

Johns Hopkins Medicine has more on elective versus emergency surgery.

SOURCE: UCLA, news release, June 3, 2025