Medicare patients nationwide have low rates of preventive care visits—with the lowest rates found in older adults of minority race/ethnicity, reports a study in the September issue of Medical Care.
Lower use of the Medicare Annual Wellness Visit (AWV) by non-white patients is partially explained by income and education—suggesting that the difference is related to factors associated with racial and ethnic inequality, according to the research by Kimberly E. Lind, Ph.D., MPH, and colleagues of the Colorado School of Public Health and the University of Colorado School of Medicine at the Anschutz Medical Campus in Aurora, Colo.
