Prevalence and Correlates of Unmet Medical and Social Needs in Virginia's Medicaid Managed Long Term Services and Supports Program

Prevalence and Correlates of Unmet Medical and Social Needs in Virginia's Medicaid Managed Long Term Services and Supports Program

Medicaid Long Term Services and Support (LTSS) programs serve individuals with complex medical and social needs. Increasingly, state Medicaid programs are contracting with managed care organizations to administer LTSS programs. Understand the prevalence of and risk factors for unmet medical and soci...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Published in:Medical care Vol. 62; no. 2; pp. 93 - 101
Main Authors: Marks, Sarah J, Saunders, Heather, Shadowen, Hannah, McCray, Neil, Bachireddy, Chethan, Dagenhart, Sandra, Brown, Sandra, Guerra, Lauren, Cunningham, Peter J
Format: Journal Article
Language:English
Published: United States Lippincott Williams & Wilkins Ovid Technologies 01-02-2024
Subjects:
Cross-Sectional Studies
Food security
Government programs
Health care access
Health care policy
Health disparities
Health risks
Health services
Health surveys
Housing
Humans
Medicaid
Nutritional status
Organizations
Prevalence
Race factors
Racial differences
Risk factors
United States
Virginia
United States
Virginia
United States > US
Online Access:Get full text
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
Description
Summary:Medicaid Long Term Services and Support (LTSS) programs serve individuals with complex medical and social needs. Increasingly, state Medicaid programs are contracting with managed care organizations to administer LTSS programs. Understand the prevalence of and risk factors for unmet medical and social needs among a sample of patients within a Medicaid managed LTSS program. We surveyed a cross-sectional random sample of 798 community-residing individuals over 21 in Virginia who were served by the state Medicaid managed LTSS program. Outcomes of interest include 3 distinct medical needs: medical appointments, medical transportation, and prescriptions; 4 distinct social needs: housing security, food security, utility bills, and nonmedical transportation, and composite measures of unmet social and medical needs. We found that 12.5% of our sample had any unmet medical need, while far more (62.2%) of our sample had any unmet social needs, with food insecurity being the most common. We found that members of color had almost 2 times the odds of having both unmet social and medical needs [social: adjusted odds ratio (aOR): 2.21; 95% confidence Interval (CI): (1.59, 3.09); medical aOR: 2.25 ; 95% CI: (1.34, 3.8)]. Medicaid members may not be fully realizing the potential of LTSS programs and would benefit from both Medicaid agency and managed care organizations' strategies aimed at addressing social drivers of health. To achieve health equity for LTSS members of color, Medicaid agencies may consider policies specifically targeting racial disparities.
Bibliography:ObjectType-Article-1
SourceType-Scholarly Journals-1
ObjectType-Feature-2
content type line 23
ISSN:0025-7079
1537-1948
DOI:10.1097/MLR.0000000000001957