Importance of a Regular Source of Medical Care Among the Elderly

Abstract

In recent years health services researchers have become increasingly aware of the importance of a regular doctor to whom the patient usually goes when sick or in need of advice about health, as a means of providing a point of entry to needed medical care. For example, persons who have a regular source of care seem more likely to receive an annual physical examination, to experience continuity of care when needed, and to be satisfied with the care received. Yet, despite the importance of an established tie to a regular treatment source, evidence is scanty with respect to the aged. To address the issue, this study employs data from a national probability sample of 11,619 persons, of whom 1,506 were aged 65 or older. The findings indicate that several factors (e.g., sex, race, education, and community size) which traditionally have served as important indicators of the use of health services fail to emerge as strong determinants regarding the regular source of care among the aged. The consequences of these findings and implications for future research are discussed.

Forced Disruption in Continuity of Primary Care: The Patients' Perspective

“…Studies of continuity of care have focused on a broad range of definitions and dimensions of care continuity ranging from the patient's likelihood of seeing the same primary care physician on subsequent visits (Fleming, Bentz, Shahady, Abrantes and Bolick 1986) to nursing home patients transferred to community hospitals (Susman, Zervanos and Byerly 1989), or to having a regular source of medical care (Kleiman 1979). Alternative measures of continuity of patient care have been developed using individual patient-based and visit-based measures (Eriksson 1990).…”

Regular Source of Care and the Minority Aged

“…Our findings show that the white elderly were more likely to have a regular source of care than were the nonwhite elderly, but this difference was not statistically significant. These findings are consistent with those of a previous study that showed little difference by race in the probability of elderly persons having a regular source of care 7 . In the current study, however, the type of setting of the usual source of medical care was also examined.…”

“…The findings in this investigation confirm those of an earlier study 7 that reported insignificant differences by race in the probability of a person's having a regular source of medical care. The data, however, suggested that there may be qualitative differences in the characteristics of the usual sources of care that serve the white and nonwhite elderly population.…”

“…In recent years there has been a growing awareness of the importance of having a regular point of entry into the health care system 1–7 . It has been suggested that a regular source of medical care results in higher quality and less fragmented treatment 2 and increases the probability that medical services will be obtained 1,3,4 .…”

“…This is particularly evident when economically disadvantaged groups are examined 6 . In one recent study, 7 however, it has been claimed that although differences in access to a regular source of care may exist for the population as a whole, there do not appear to be any significant differences when attention is focused on the elderly: “Results for race indicate only small differences between elderly blacks and nonblacks in the likelihood of having a regular doctor or clinic. Virtually the same percentage of blacks (10.0 per cent) as of nonblacks (10.8 per cent) report no regular therapeutic source.”…”