Racial and Gender Disparities in Mental Illness: An analysis of New Jersey Inpatient Hospital Discharges from 2005 to 2009

This study intends to identify if racial and gender disparities are specific to different types of mental illness and if there are race-gender interactions among the illness types. Inpatient acute discharges for mental illness were extracted from NJ hospital discharge data (2005-2009) using Major Diagnostic Category (MDC) 19. Eight categories of mental illness were identified using ICD-9 diagnosis codes. These are mood disorder, schizophrenia, personality disorder, anxiety disorder, ADHD, autism, eating disorder, and dementia. Suicide attempts and substance abuse among these discharges were also identified. The results showed that discharges for mental illness increased by 9% from 2005-2009 in NJ. The most common type of illness was mood disorder (50.2% of all mental health discharges) followed by schizophrenia (26.7%) and anxiety (13.3%). The greatest increase from 2005-2009 was found in autism (91.7%) followed by eating disorder (34.7%) and ADHD(32.2%). Additionally, diagnoses of substance abuse (43%) and suicide attempts/suicidal ideation (12%) were found among these discharges. Significant racial disparities and race-gender interactions were found among different types of illness. Whites had a higher incidence of mood, anxiety disorder, and suicidal ideation while blacks had a higher incidence of schizophrenia and substance abuse than other races. Gender disparities were also found with women having higher incidence of mood, anxiety, eating disorders, and dementia than men. Significant gender-race interactions were found in personality disorder, suicide attempt, and dementia with white women having a higher incidence of these illnesses than white men, but these differences were not found between black men and black women.