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Access to Care for Homeless Veterans During Disasters
Introduction: Since 1970, natural disasters have led to both temporary and permanent closures of multiple medical centers and outpatient clinics at the US Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) nationwide. Access to care during such events is critical for vulnerable populations, especially homeless vet...
Autores principales: | , , |
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Formato: | Online Artículo Texto |
Lenguaje: | English |
Publicado: |
SAGE Publications
2018
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Materias: | |
Acceso en línea: | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6287296/ http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/2150132718815382 |
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author | Gable, Alicia R. Der-Martirosian, Claudia Dobalian, Aram |
author_facet | Gable, Alicia R. Der-Martirosian, Claudia Dobalian, Aram |
author_sort | Gable, Alicia R. |
collection | PubMed |
description | Introduction: Since 1970, natural disasters have led to both temporary and permanent closures of multiple medical centers and outpatient clinics at the US Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) nationwide. Access to care during such events is critical for vulnerable populations, especially homeless veterans. As such, facility closures may disproportionately affect homeless veteran patients who are both more likely to experience adverse effects from disasters and face multiple barriers to care. Methods: A cross-sectional survey was administered to a probability sample of 2000 homeless VA patients living in and receiving VA health care in the Northeast United States. The survey was completed by 383 respondents (20% adjusted response rate). This pilot study examines predictors of difficulty accessing care in the event that the VA facility that homeless VA patients routinely use is forced to close because of a natural disaster. Results: In a multivariate logistic regression, homeless VA patients who had Medicaid were less likely (OR 0.38; 95% CI: 0.18-0.78; P < .01) to report that they would have difficulty obtaining care elsewhere if their normal VA facility was closed in a future natural disaster. Conclusions: Findings suggest that Medicaid coverage has the potential to facilitate access to care for homeless veteran VA patients during disasters. Policy changes that decrease Medicaid coverage could limit access to care for homeless veterans during closures of VA medical facilities. |
format | Online Article Text |
id | pubmed-6287296 |
institution | National Center for Biotechnology Information |
language | English |
publishDate | 2018 |
publisher | SAGE Publications |
record_format | MEDLINE/PubMed |
spelling | pubmed-62872962018-12-13 Access to Care for Homeless Veterans During Disasters Gable, Alicia R. Der-Martirosian, Claudia Dobalian, Aram J Prim Care Community Health Pilot Studies Introduction: Since 1970, natural disasters have led to both temporary and permanent closures of multiple medical centers and outpatient clinics at the US Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) nationwide. Access to care during such events is critical for vulnerable populations, especially homeless veterans. As such, facility closures may disproportionately affect homeless veteran patients who are both more likely to experience adverse effects from disasters and face multiple barriers to care. Methods: A cross-sectional survey was administered to a probability sample of 2000 homeless VA patients living in and receiving VA health care in the Northeast United States. The survey was completed by 383 respondents (20% adjusted response rate). This pilot study examines predictors of difficulty accessing care in the event that the VA facility that homeless VA patients routinely use is forced to close because of a natural disaster. Results: In a multivariate logistic regression, homeless VA patients who had Medicaid were less likely (OR 0.38; 95% CI: 0.18-0.78; P < .01) to report that they would have difficulty obtaining care elsewhere if their normal VA facility was closed in a future natural disaster. Conclusions: Findings suggest that Medicaid coverage has the potential to facilitate access to care for homeless veteran VA patients during disasters. Policy changes that decrease Medicaid coverage could limit access to care for homeless veterans during closures of VA medical facilities. SAGE Publications 2018-12-04 /pmc/articles/PMC6287296/ http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/2150132718815382 Text en © The Author(s) 2018 http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License (http://www.creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) which permits any use, reproduction and distribution of the work without further permission provided the original work is attributed as specified on the SAGE and Open Access pages (https://us.sagepub.com/en-us/nam/open-access-at-sage). |
spellingShingle | Pilot Studies Gable, Alicia R. Der-Martirosian, Claudia Dobalian, Aram Access to Care for Homeless Veterans During Disasters |
title | Access to Care for Homeless Veterans During Disasters |
title_full | Access to Care for Homeless Veterans During Disasters |
title_fullStr | Access to Care for Homeless Veterans During Disasters |
title_full_unstemmed | Access to Care for Homeless Veterans During Disasters |
title_short | Access to Care for Homeless Veterans During Disasters |
title_sort | access to care for homeless veterans during disasters |
topic | Pilot Studies |
url | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6287296/ http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/2150132718815382 |
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