Racial and Ethnic Differences in Hospitalization Rates Among Aged Medicare Beneficiaries, 1998

Efforts to study racial variations in access to health care for minorities other than black persons have been hampered by a paucity of data. The Health Care Financing Administration (HCFA) has made efforts in the past few years to enhance the racial codes on the Medicare enrollment files to include Hispanic, Asian American, and Native American designations. This study examines hospitalization rates by these more detailed racial/ethnic groupings. The results show black, Hispanic, and Native American aged beneficiaries compared with white beneficiaries have higher hospitalization rates. Asian American beneficiaries have lower hospitalization rates. Rates of revascularization—coronary artery bypass graft (CABG) and percutaneous transluminal coronary angioplasty (PTCA)—are lower for black, Hispanic, and Native American beneficiaries compared with white beneficiaries, while rates for Asian Americans are similar to rates for white beneficiaries.