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Poor Self-Rated Health Is Associated with Hospitalization and Emergency Department Visits in African American Older Adults with Diabetes

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Abstract

Objectives

We investigated the associations between poor self-rated health (SRH), hospitalization, and emergency department (ED) visits among African American older adults with diabetes mellitus (DM).

Methods

This survey recruited 235 non-institutionalized African American older adults (age > = 55 years) with diabetes mellitus (DM). Participants were recruited using a convenience sample from economically disadvantaged urban areas of South Los Angeles, California. Poor SRH was the independent variable. Hospitalization and ED visits in the past 12 months were the outcomes. Demographic factors, health [comorbid medical conditions (CMCs) and polypharmacy], health behaviors (smoking and drinking), and access (difficulty accessing care, dissatisfaction with the medical care, routine source of care, and visiting the same doctor) were confounders. Binary logistic regressions were used for data analysis.

Results

Poor SRH was associated with higher odds of hospitalization and ED visit, while all covariates were controlled.

Conclusions

Poor SRH may be predictive of increased healthcare utilization among African American older adults with DM. Research should test whether close monitoring of African American older adults with DM and poor SRH helps reduce their frequency of hospitalization and ED visits or not.

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Funding

This study was supported by the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) Grant 1H0CMS331621 (PI: M. Bazargan). Bazargan and Assari are also funded by the following NIH grants: 54MD008149 and MD007610, 2U54MD007598, and U54 TR001627.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Family Medicine, Charles R. Drew University of Medicine and Science, Los Angeles, CA, USA

    Shervin Assari

  2. Charles R. Drew University of Medicine and Science (CDU), Los Angeles, CA, USA

    James Smith & Mohsen Bazargan

  3. University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), Los Angeles, CA, USA

    Mohsen Bazargan

Authors
  1. Shervin Assari
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  2. James Smith
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  3. Mohsen Bazargan
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Contributions

Mohsen Bazargan: Conceptualization of the study, study design, funding acquisition, data analysis, overseeing the study, and approval of the final draft

Shervin Assari: First draft, contribution to the revision of the manuscript, revision of the paper, and approval of the final draft

James Smith: contribution to the study design, conducting the interviews, data gathering, data entry, and contribution to the draft and revision.

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Shervin Assari.

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The authors declare that they have no competing interests.

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Assari, S., Smith, J. & Bazargan, M. Poor Self-Rated Health Is Associated with Hospitalization and Emergency Department Visits in African American Older Adults with Diabetes. J. Racial and Ethnic Health Disparities 7, 880–887 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s40615-020-00711-z

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