Key clinical point: Insurance can help mediate racial disparities in breast cancer.

Major finding: Insurance coverage status accounts for nearly half the risk of later-stage breast cancer diagnosis among racial/ethnic minorities.

Study details: Researchers looked at seven years of data from the Surveillance, Epidemiology, and End Results database on women receiving a breast cancer diagnosis, accounting for age, race/ethnicity, and insurance status to determine the role of insurance coverage in rates of later-stage breast cancer diagnosis.

Disclosures: Funding sources include the National Institutes of Health, National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences, National Cancer Institute, and National Institute on Minority Health and Health Disparities. The authors reported no conflicts of interest related to this study.