Social Needs and Health-Related Outcomes Among Medicaid Beneficiaries

Tess Thompson · Amy McQueen · Merriah A. Croston · Alina A. Luke · Nicole M. Caito · Karyn Quinn +2 more

75 citations0/0 files storedHealth Education & Behavior

No readable copy stored yet — this record is metadata only.

No open-access location is known for this record yet.

Literature note Cite in a project Citation map

Health disparities and outcomes Food Security and Health in Diverse Populations Public Health and Social Inequalities

Abstract

Unmet social needs-including food, housing, and utilities-have been associated with negative health outcomes, but most prior research has examined the health associations with a single unmet need or analyzed samples that were homogeneous along one or more dimensions (e.g., older adults or patients with chronic health conditions). We examined the association between unmet social needs and psychosocial and health-related outcomes in a sample of Medicaid beneficiaries from 35 U.S. states. In 2016-2017, 1,214 people completed an online survey about social needs, demographics, and health-related and psychosocial outcomes. Seven items assessing social needs formed an index in which higher scores indicated higher levels of unmet needs. Participants were eligible if they were ≥18 years and had Medicaid. The sample was predominantly female (87%). Most (71%) lived with at least one child ≤18 years, and 49% were White and 33% were African American. Average age was 36 years ( SD = 13). The most common unmet needs were not enough money for unexpected expenses (54%) and not enough space in the home (25%). Analyses controlling for recruitment method and demographics showed that increasing levels of unmet social needs were positively associated with stress, smoking, and number of chronic conditions, and negatively associated with future orientation, attitudes toward prevention, days of exercise/week, servings of fruits or vegetables/day, and self-rated health (all p < .01). Results add to the evidence about the relationship between unmet social needs and health. Interventions to help meet social needs may help low-income people improve both their economic situations and their health.

Paper brief

Loading…

Cite this work

Citation unavailable for this work.

BibTeX RIS CSL-JSON

No public copy is stored for this record, so only the metadata is cited.

Citations in this library

Citation map →

Stored only when both papers are in the corpus — 75 citations exist upstream.

References

1983A Global Measure of Perceived Stress 1993Motivation and personality 2008Closing the gap in a generation: health equity through action on the social determinants of health 2014The Social Determinants of Health: It's Time to Consider the Causes of the Causes 2011The Social Determinants of Health: Coming of Age 1989The social psychology of health 2013Scarcity: Why Having Too Little Means So Much 2012WHO European review of social determinants of health and the health divide

Cited by

2021ICD-10 Z-Code Health-Related Social Needs and Increased Healthcare Utilization 2021The association between social needs and chronic conditions in a large, urban primary care population 2020Material hardship, perceived stress, and health in early adulthood 2020Social Risks Among Primary Care Patients in a Large Urban Health System 2020How Do Social Needs Cluster Among Low-Income Individuals?2023Health related social needs and whole person health: Relationship between unmet social needs, health outcomes, and healthcare spending among commercially insured adults

Explore the map →

Papers that cite the same references — the relational fallback while embeddings are still backfilling.

Imported from OpenAlex (CC0) — nothing here is generated.