ArticleAre two doctors better than one? Women’s physician use and appropriate care
Section snippets
Data source
Data are from the Women’s Health Care Experiences Survey conducted in Baltimore, Maryland in 1999. This survey instrument was developed to provide a more comprehensive description of nonelderly women’s health care access, utilization, and quality than is available in other surveys.8 The survey was developed through several phases, including a content comparison of national surveys, identification of key domains in women’s health care, expert feedback, and cognitive testing of a draft instrument
Sample characteristics
Table 1 describes the sociodemographic, health status, and health care utilization characteristics of the sample. Because needs for reproductive and non-reproductive services are expected to be associated with age, we present these results for two age groups: ages 18–44 (the so-called “reproductive years”) and ages 45–64 (“midlife”). Midlife women are significantly more likely than younger women to be white, to have lower educations, to have the highest household incomes ($75,000 or more), and
Key findings
Seeing two physicians for regular care (a generalist and an ob/gyn), compared with seeing a generalist alone, is consistently associated with nonelderly women’s receipt of more recommended clinical preventive services. In this study, we were able to examine receipt of a wider range of clinical preventive services than previously studied, including screening services, counseling on a variety of topics, and services related to prevention of heart disease. The relationship between the pattern of
Acknowledgements
Funding for this research was provided by the Maternal and Child Health Bureau (HRSA, DHHS) to the Johns Hopkins University Women’s and Children’s Health Policy Center [U93-MC00101]. Jillian Henderson was also supported by a predoctoral training grant from the National Institute on Aging [T32-AG00134]. Opinions expressed do not necessarily reflect the views of the Bureau, HRSA, or the Department of Health and Human Services.
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