New study profiles women's use of health care

Citation

(2001), "New study profiles women's use of health care", International Journal of Health Care Quality Assurance, Vol. 14 No. 7. https://doi.org/10.1108/ijhcqa.2001.06214gab.013

New study profiles women's use of health care

New study profiles women's use of health care

A new report from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) in Atlanta has found that women's use of ambulatory medical care differs from men's. Even excluding pregnancy-related visits, women were 33 percent more likely than men to visit a doctor, although this difference decreased with age. The study, over 1997-1998, showed that:

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  On average, women made about 4.6 visits a year in 1997-98, ranging from 3.8 for those 15-44 to about double that for those 65 and older.

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  Visits by younger women were more likely to be to primary care physicians and emergency departments, while older women were more likely to see specialists.

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  Compared with white women, black women had higher rates of visits for hypertension, complications of pregnancy, and diabetes.

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  More than four out of five ambulatory medical care visits were made to office-based physicians; the rest were about equal between hospital out-patient and emergency departments.

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  The most common diagnostic or screening service for women was blood pressure screening performed in over half of all visits. Pelvic exams were performed during about 14 percent of the visits and urinalysis in about the same number of visits. The rate of mammography was about 29 percent lower for women 65 and over than for women 45-64 years of age.

Among the major classes of drugs, those most frequently prescribed for women were for the cardiovascular-renal and central nervous systems, as well as hormones. The specific therapeutic classes most frequently prescribed were nonnarcotic analgesics, antidepressants and estrogen/progestin.

The most frequent sources of payment for ambulatory care visits by women were private insurance (50 percent), Medicare (22 percent), and Medicaid (9 percent). The proportion of visits covered by private insurance was 1.3 times as high among white women as among black women. In contrast, the proportion of ambulatory visits by black women covered by Medicaid was more than three times as high as the proportion of Medicaid visits by white women.

Further information: for more information about the survey and to view or download the report visit the Web site at: http://www.cdc.gov/nchs