Data Sources for Evaluating Health Disparities in Ophthalmology: Where We Are and Where We Need to Go

Data provide an opportunity to discover disparities and inequities that may otherwise be unrecognized. Within the American Academy of Ophthalmology (AAO) Task Force on Disparities in Eye Care, the Leveraging Data Sub-task Force was charged with identifying data sources to study health disparities in eye care and to leverage data to advance health equity. We evaluated large data sources to determine their strengths, deficiencies, and relative accessibility in relation to the likelihood of identifying eye care disparities. We highlight the current challenges with these data sources and review key recommendations for improving future sources for studying health disparities in eye care.