Objective: To assess whether cultural familiarity, measured by Asian American, Native Hawaiian, and Pacific Islander (AANHPI) hospital patient volume, is associated with care processes and outcomes among very low birth weight (VLBW) infants. Study Design: We analyzed 43,067 infants, including 6,534 (15.2%) AANHPI infants, from 142 California neonatal intensive care units (NICUs) in the California Perinatal Quality Care Collaborative (2011–2019). Hospitals were grouped into tertiles by AANHPI VLBW admissions. Multivariable Poisson regression adjusted for infant, maternal, and hospital factors. Result: Mortality and major morbidities did not differ by AANHPI patient volume. Unadjusted analyses showed higher human milk use at discharge in high- and middle-tertile NICUs (79.2% and 77.0% vs. 69.6%, p<.001), and higher growth velocity in high-tertile NICUs (13.3 vs. 12.8 g/kg/day, p<.001), but these differences were attenuated after adjustment. Conclusion: NICU AANHPI VLBW patient volume was associated with feeding related outcomes but not neonatal morbidity and mortality.
Olatunji et al. (Mon,) studied this question.