PII-085 - POTENTIAL HEALTHCARE DISPARITIES AMONG PATIENTS WHO REGISTER FOR NOVEL PHARMACOGENETICS CONSULTATION SERVICE

M. Norris¹, E. Eken^2,3, C. McDonough⁴, K. Wiisanen^2,3, E. Cicali^5,3; ¹University of Florida, Gainesville, FL, , ²Department of Pharmacotherapy and Translational Research, University of Florida College of Pharmacy, Gainesville, FL, USA, ³Center for Pharmacogenomics and Precision Medicine, Gainesville, FL, USA, ⁴Department of Pharmacotherapy and Translational Research and Center for Pharmacogenomics and Precision Medicine, University of Florida College of Pharmacy, Gainesville, FL, USA, ⁵Department of Pharmacotherapy and Translational Research , University of Florida College of Pharmacy, Gainesville, FL, USA.

Background: In 2022, The University of Florida Health Precision Medicine Program (PMP) changed the model of their pharmacist-led pharmacogenetics (PGx) consultation clinic from in-person insurance billed to virtual patient-paid visits and branded the clinic as MyRx. Individuals either self-refer or are prescriber-referred for PGx consultation. There are multiple aspects to our model that may be impacted by access, including a patient-paid cash price and virtual educational consultations requiring a stable internet connection. However, our goal is to avoid creating additional health care disparities and further decreasing access to PGx testing. Therefore, we investigated if the individuals who were referred to MyRx but ultimately declined registration are medically underserved.

Methods: MyRx referrals and their registration outcome are tracked for clinical purposes. Demographic data (race, ethnicity, sex, birthdate, and zip code) is available when patients register or if they are an existing UF Health patient. Zip code was used to derive social deprivation index (SDI), a composite measure of deprivation. The SDI score was compared between individuals who registered for MyRx with those who did not using regression models. Categorical variables were compared between groups using chi-square tests.

Results: 1,246 individuals were referred to MyRx between April 2022 and September 2023. Demographic data was available for 41% of the population (n=512). Of those with data available, 24% registered for services (REG), while 76% declined (DECL). The majority were white (74%), non-Hispanic (93%) and female (65%), these were not significantly different between registration status groups (p=0.61, p=0.07, p= 0.32, respectively). The mean age was 42 ± 23 for REG and 47 ± 21 for DECL (p=0.02). The mean SDI was 47.6 in REG and 52.3 in DECL (p=0.07).

Conclusion: Individuals in the REG group were significantly younger, possibly suggesting more value for younger patients. SDI and Hispanic descent were trending to suggest that individuals with less social deprivation were more likely to register and Hispanic individuals were less likely to register. These trends suggest the MyRx model may increase health disparities and should be closely monitored moving forward.