Study: Skin of Color Patients Are Under-represented in Cosmetic Clinical Trials

There’s a lack of ethnic/racial diversity in industry-sponsored aesthetic trials, according to new research in the April 2022 issue of Lasers in Surgery and Medicine.

Researchers, led by Lisa Akintilo MD, MPH a current PGY-4 dermatology resident at New York University, analyzed published cosmetic randomized controlled trials, both industry-sponsored and investigator-initiated, to better characterize and assess representation of skin of color participants over the past three decades. They found that industry sponsorship correlates with poor study participant ethnic/racial diversity in aesthetic randomized controlled trials. 

“We did this study because despite cosmetic procedures being on the rise in the US in all demographics, cosmetic procedures remain heavily skewed towards non-skin of color patients. Similarly, many published aesthetic clinical trials have poor representation and inclusion of non-white patients,” Dr. Akintilo says in a news release. “We believe this work is important as it highlights the need for cosmetic clinical trials to be more representative of the ever-increasing diversity of our world. This should serve as a call to action for industries to increase the inclusion of skin of color participants in their studies.”