Erratum to: Are Detailed, Patient-level Social Determinant of Health Factors Associated With Physical Function and Mental Health at Presentation Among New Patients With Orthopaedic Conditions?

In the study, “Are Detailed, Patient-level Social Determinant of Health Factors Associated With Physical Function and Mental Health at Presentation Among New Patients With Orthopaedic Conditions?,” the authors uncovered a documentation error in the data used for the analysis when conducting future research. Although the statistical analyses are accurate, patients were—in fact—not just from new patient encounters but also from follow-up visits. Thus, the findings of the study assess the association between detailed, patient-level social determinant of health factors and physical function and mental health more broadly across patient encounters, not just for new patients or at new patient encounters.

In light of this finding, broadly speaking, all references to “new patients,” “new patient encounters,” and/or “at presentation” (where taken to mean “at initial presentation”) should be removed from the manuscript. The results otherwise were correct; the difference is the population to which the study’s findings apply, namely to all patient visits and not just to new patient visits. Specifically, we would like to clarify the language in our manuscript as follows:

The title of the article should now read, “Are Detailed, Patient-level Social Determinant of Health Factors Associated With Physical Function and Mental Health Among Patients With Orthopaedic Conditions?”

In the Abstract and in the Introduction, the study questions should now read: “(1) What percentage of patients presenting for care at an orthopaedic surgery clinic who were unemployed but seeking work reported transportation issues that could limit their ability to attend a medical appointment or acquire medications, reported trouble paying for medications, and/or had no current housing? (2) Accounting for traditional sociodemographic factors and patient-level SDoH measures, what factors are associated with poorer patient-reported outcome physical health scores in a clinic setting? (3) Accounting for traditional sociodemographic factor patient-level SDoH measures, what factors are associated with poorer patient-reported outcome mental health scores in a clinic setting?”

In the Abstract, the first line of the Methods section of the Abstract, the text should start with, “Patient encounters…”.

In the Abstract, the second line of the Methods section should now read, in part, “…had completed the Patient-Reported Outcome Measure Information System (PROMIS) Global-10 at an orthopaedic surgery clinic encounter…”.

In the Abstract, the sixth line of the Methods section should now read, in part, “Because we do not have a way to determine how many patients had both primary care provider office visits and orthopaedic surgery clinic visits over the study period…”.

In the Abstract, the ninth line of the Abstract should now read, in part, “…we reviewed all completed patient clinic encounters…”.

In the Abstract, the 11^th line of the Methods section should now read, in part, “mental health symptoms (that is, lower PROMIS scores) at patient…”.

In the Abstract, the first sentence of the Conclusion should now read, “Although transportation issues and financial hardship were found to be associated with worse physical function and mental health, Medicaid and workers compensation insurance remained associated with worse physical function and mental health as well even after controlling for these more detailed, patient-level SDoH factors.”

In the Patients and Methods section, the first sentence under the “Participants” subheading should start with “We identified all patients presenting for an orthopaedic surgery…”

In the Patients and Methods section, the fourth sentence under the “Participants” subheading should now read, “Thus, patients included in our study met the following two criteria: patient visit to an orthopaedic surgery clinic at our institution with completion of the PROMIS Global-10 and a primary care visit at our institution with completion of the SDoH questionnaire.”

In the Patients and Methods section, the last two sentences under the “Participants” subheading should now read, “Because we did not have a way to determine how many patients had both primary care provider office visits and orthopaedic surgery clinic visits over the study period, we were unable to determine how many patients could have been included. Overall, 9057 patient encounters met our inclusion criteria.”

Under the subheading “Factors Associated With Poorer Scores for Physical Health” in the Results section, the first sentence should read, in part, “…were associated with worse physical health (Table 3)”. The second sentence should end with “…were also associated with worse physical health…”

Under the subheading “Factors Associated With Poorer Scores for Mental Health” in the Results section, the first sentence should now read, in part, “…medications was associated with worse mental health…”. The second sentence should now read, in part, “…were associated with worse mental health…”.

In the first paragraph of the Discussion, the seventh, eighth, and ninth sentences should now read, “However, the results from this study indicate that a lack of transportation and trouble paying for medications were associated with worse physical health. Trouble paying for medications was also associated with worse mental health. Even after accounting for specific SDoH confounders, Medicaid and workers compensation insurance remained associated with worse physical and mental health, suggesting other elements engrained in these insurance variables are important to determine and consider.”

Under the Limitations subheading in our Discussion, the second sentence should now read, in part, “…had an orthopaedic surgery clinic visit…”.

Under the subheading “Factors Associated With Poorer Scores for Physical and Mental Health” in the Discussion, the first sentence should now read, “The factors associated with worse patient physical and mental health were not entirely unexpected.” The second sentence should now read, in part, “The association of transportation difficulties with worse symptoms…”.

In the Discussion, the fourth sentence under the subheading “Factors Associated With Poorer Scores for Physical and Mental Health” should now read, “The finding that patients covered by Medicaid have worse symptoms was unsurprising, given prior research [3, 11].”

In the Discussion, under the subheading “Factors Associated With Poorer Scores for Physical and Mental Health,” the 11^th sentence should now read, “Similarly, patients with workers compensation insurance also had clinically worse symptoms when seeking care at an orthopaedic surgery clinic.”

In the Discussion section, under the subheading “Factors Associated With Poorer Scores for Physical and Mental Health,” the 13^th sentence should now read, “Workplace injuries might be more severe, leading to worse physical function.”

The title of the table that is Supplementary Digital Content 2 should now read, “Descriptive characteristics of patients at clinic encounters, March 2018 to December 2020 (n = 135,223)”.

The main findings of this study remain correct as they were initially published, but, as noted, they apply to the population of all patients presenting for care, not only the population of patients presenting for initial evaluation. The article has been updated to reflect these changes.

The authors greatly apologize for these errors.