A new study commissioned by the Kaiser Family Foundation and authored by Dr. Jack Hadley of The Urban Institute and featured in the March 14, 2007, Journal of the American Medical Association theme issue on Access to Care documents that people who are uninsured receive less care and have worse outcomes following an accident or the onset of a new chronic condition than those with insurance. 

The study -- based on analysis of eight years of data and over 30,000 observations -- finds that following an accidental injury, the uninsured were less likely than the insured to receive any medical care (78.8% vs. 88.7%).  Similarly, the uninsured with a new chronic condition were also less likely to receive care (81.7% vs. 91.5%).  In addition, the uninsured with an injury were also twice as likely as those with insurance to have received none of the recommended follow-up care (19.3% vs 9.2%), and a similar pattern held for those with a new chronic condition (9.4% vs 4.4%).  In addition, the uninsured with an injury were about twice as likely not to have received any recommended follow-up care (19.3% vs. 9.2%), as was also the case with new chronic conditions.   Ultimately, the study indicates that the uninsured were more likely to report not fully recovering and no longer being treated following an accident and roughly seven months after the initial health shock, the uninsured with new chronic conditions reported worse health status than the insured with similar conditions. 

 JAMA Article (free access)

 View Webcast of JAMA Theme Issue Media Briefing: Access To Care featuring author Dr. Jack Hadley