Annals of family medicine
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Annals of family medicine · Jan 2021
Cherry Blossoms, COVID-19, and the Opportunity for a Healthy Life.
To date, short-term funding and policy fixes for the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic have focused on saving the current health care system; policies have not maximized the population's health, prioritized the safety net, nor addressed the fundamental problems that have hindered our nation's response for our most vulnerable neighbors. We need to plan more lasting equity-specific reforms now. I explain 3 lessons that should inform reforms to the health care delivery and payment systems to reduce health disparities and maximize the public's health: (1) Proven roadmaps and processes for reducing health care disparities already exist, as do themes of successful interventions. Implement them; (2) Payment reform needs to create a business case for health care organizations to address social determinants of health and implement care interventions to reduce health disparities; (3) We as a nation need to have hard conversations about whether we truly value the opportunity for everyone to have a healthy life.
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Annals of family medicine · Jan 2021
Decreasing Use of Primary Care: A Repeated Cross-Sectional Study of MEPS 2007-2017.
We sought to describe the proportion of patients in contact with a primary care physician, as well as the total number of primary care contacts over a 2-year period, using the 2002-2017 Medical Expenditure Panel Survey. The rate of any contact with a primary care physician for patients in the population decreased by 2.5% over the study period (adjusted odds ratio [aOR] = 0.99 per panel, 95% CI, 0.98-0.99; P <.001). ⋯ The decreases were observed across all age groups at varying rates. The results of this study suggest that the driver for the previously reported decreases in primary care visits is secondary to fewer contacts per patient.