Access to Care and Use of Health Services by Low-Income Women

This article, by Ruth Almeida and Lisa Dubay of the Urban Institute and Grace Ko of Brown University, examines the effect of insurance on low-income women’s access to care and use of health services. Using the 1997 National Survey of America’s Families, it examines access to health care for three groups of low-income women: those with Medicaid, those with private coverage, and those with no insurance. Uninsured low-income women were found to have experienced greater barriers to care and to have utilized fewer services, particularly preventive care, than women with either public or private coverage. Low-income women with Medicaid and private coverage had similar access to care indicating that broadening health care coverage options, either through the public-sector or through private options, would improve access to care for low-income women.

This article appeared in the Health Care Financing Review, Summer 2001, Vol. 22, No.4: 27-47 and was funded by the Kaiser Family Foundation.

Journal Article (.pdf)