Access to Health Care

1. Presented by: Samantha DeBonis, Magan Kustera, Joe Senni, Kristin Wiley Access to Health Care

2. Introduction The reason why we put together this survey is to find out if the cost of health insurance was effecting families decisions to seek physician care. Insurance is available through… Public – governed (Medicare, Medicaid) Private – commercial, profit (Cigna, Aetna, Horizon Blue Cross Blue Shield) Types of Insurance: Policies – Basic, Major Medical, Comprehensive Plans – individual, group, free-for-service, fixed dollar (set rate), Medicare, Medicaid

3. Introduction (cont.) Co pay – flat dollar amount that needs to be paid before services. (i.e $10 - $35) ; co-insurance may or may not be needed Co-insurance – a percentage of the cost Deductibles – a specified amount of money that the insured must pay before an insurance company will pay a claim

4. Methodology • We created a simple ten-question survey asking for broad, yet general knowledge on their health care status and how they feel towards their coverage. • As a group, we passed out our surveys at Dorothy L. Bullock School in Glassboro to parents of families and received back over 100 questionnaires. • We took this information, charted our statistics, and found a significant lack of knowledge.

5. How many people live in your household? When asked how many people lived within their household, 12% said between 1-2, 69% said 3-4, 20% said 5-6, and 1% said 7-8. No one had over nine people living with them.

6. How many adults live in your household? 89% of these families are said to have 1-2 adults living with them, which is a huge percentage compared to the 10% who have identified 3-4 adults and the 2% who have had 5 or more.

7. Are you employed? 90% were, while the other 13% are not. There were staggering results when we asked those who’ve said yes to the above question how many hours a week they work.

8. How many hours do you work a week? Out of those 90 individuals, 2 work 15 or less hours a week, 5 work 20-25, 8 work 26-34, 43 work 35-40, 20 work 41-45, and an impressive 12 individuals work over 46 hours a week.

9. Do you have health insurance? When asked if they had health insurance, 91% responded yes, 8% said no, and 1% didn’t know. We went on to assess what kind of insurance these individuals had.

10. Do you have private or public insurance? The majority of these participants have a private insurance provider (78 individuals), 15 had public, and four respondents left the answer blank or were not sure.

11. What are your monthly premiums? In regards to their monthly premium, only 25 individuals knew it, and the results all ranged from $25 to $550.

12. How much is your co-pay? Co-pay also ranged from 0 to $35 dollars, with 8 of those 25 not knowing their co-pay and another 8 showing no response.

13. How often do you visit a primary care physician? Monthly Our final two questions asked our participants how often they visit their primary care physician on a monthly and annual basis. Monthly  55% said less than once on a monthly basis, 20% said 1-3, 4%answered 4-6, 0 answered 7-9, and 1% answered 10+. 19% were unsure. Annually  8% see a physician less than once a year, 64% went 1-3 times, 17% went 4-6 times, 3% went 7-9, 5% went over ten, and 11% never answered or clarified. Annually

14. Does your insurance restrict you from seeing a doctor? When asked the essential question if their health insurance eligibility restricted them from seeing a doctor when they are ill, 88% said no, 9% said yes, and 4% answered sometimes.

15. Does your co-pay encourage or discourage you to see a doctor? Then we asked does the amount of your co-pay encourage or discourage you to visit your doctor for preventative and or wellness visits. 59% are encouraged, 22% are discouraged, and 18% remained unresponsive.

16. Discussion • A majority of our participants were unaware of their health insurance status. • Due to the lack of knowledge, it was very difficult to conclude if the cost of health insurance effected them seeking physician help when needed. • Our findings concluded that the cost of health care did not effect most parents in their decisions to seek care.