• Am J Prev Med · Oct 2021

    Prevalence and Determinants of Difficulty in Accessing Medical Care in U.S. Adults.

    • Mahmoud Al Rifai, Dhruv Mahtta, Riyad Kherallah, Sina Kianoush, Jing Liu, Fatima Rodriguez, Khurram Nasir, Javier Valero, Safi U Khan, Christie Ballantyne, Laura A Petersen, and Salim S Virani.
    • Section of Cardiology, Department of Medicine, Baylor College of Medicine, Houston, Texas.
    • Am J Prev Med. 2021 Oct 1; 61 (4): 492-500.

    IntroductionEnsuring adequate access to health care is essential for timely delivery of preventive services. It is important to evaluate the prevalence and determinants of difficulty in accessing medical care in the overall U.S. population and among those with high-risk chronic conditions.MethodsThe study utilized cross-sectional data from the 2016-2019 Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System, a nationally representative telephone-based survey of adults aged ≥18 years. The prevalence and sociodemographic characteristics associated with difficulty in receiving medical care were assessed, including regional variations across U.S. states.ResultsThe prevalence of difficulty in accessing medical care was 14% overall, 15% among those with hypertension, 15% among those with diabetes mellitus, and 17% among those with atherosclerotic cardiovascular disease. Age 18-34 years, having less than high school education, having annual household income <$75,000, unemployment, and living in a state without Medicaid expansion were all associated with a higher risk of not accessing medical care. The prevalence of difficulty in accessing medical care was 27% among individuals with ≥3 of these sociodemographic characteristics. There was regional variation across the U.S. states in the distribution of difficulty in accessing medical care with a median of 13.6% (IQR=11.3%-15.9%) for the overall population: 16.3% (IQR=14.1%-19.0%) among those living in states without Medicaid expansion versus 12.7% (IQR=10.9%-15.6%) among those living in states with Medicaid expansion (p=0.01).ConclusionsIn total, 1 in 7 adults report difficulty in accessing medical care. This prevalence is nearly 1 in 4 adults with ≥3 sociodemographic characteristics related to difficulty in accessing medical care. There are regional variations in the distribution of the difficulty in accessing medical care, especially among individuals living in states that have not undergone Medicaid expansion.Published by Elsevier Inc.

      Pubmed     Full text   Copy Citation     Plaintext  

      Add institutional full text...

    Notes

     
    Knowledge, pearl, summary or comment to share?
    300 characters remaining
    help        
    You can also include formatting, links, images and footnotes in your notes
    • Simple formatting can be added to notes, such as *italics*, _underline_ or **bold**.
    • Superscript can be denoted by <sup>text</sup> and subscript <sub>text</sub>.
    • Numbered or bulleted lists can be created using either numbered lines 1. 2. 3., hyphens - or asterisks *.
    • Links can be included with: [my link to pubmed](http://pubmed.com)
    • Images can be included with: ![alt text](https://bestmedicaljournal.com/study_graph.jpg "Image Title Text")
    • For footnotes use [^1](This is a footnote.) inline.
    • Or use an inline reference [^1] to refer to a longer footnote elseweher in the document [^1]: This is a long footnote..

    hide…