Healthcare Access and Health Equity Outcomes Among Adults With Cardiometabolic Conditions

Cardiometabolic diseases such as hypertension, high cholesterol, coronary artery disease, and diabetes collectively are the leading cause of cardiovascular morbidity and mortality in the United States.

OBJECTIVES: The purpose of this quantitative cross-sectional study was to analyze the influence of healthcare access (wellness visits and health insurance status), health behaviors (alcohol use and physical activity), and sociodemographic factors (race/ethnicity, sex, age, education, marital status, family job status, and body mass index) on health equity outcomes (health status) in 15,955 adult cardiometabolic National Health Interview Survey (NHIS) 2020 participants.

METHODS: Andersen’s behavioral model (conceptual theory) utilizes sociodemographic (predisposing) factors, healthcare access (enabling) factors, health behavior, cardiometabolic conditions (need), and health status (outcome) for healthcare utilization research. The 2020 NHIS secondary dataset was analyzed to address research questions using binary logistic regression.

RESULTS: The results showed that there was a statistically significant relationship between healthcare access, health behaviors, sociodemographic factors, and self-reported health status among adults with collective cardiometabolic conditions in the United States. Physical activity and alcohol use had the highest effect size, demonstrating these key variables as meaningful in predicting health equity represented by health status outcome.

CONCLUSIONS: Additional research using a longitudinal sample that was collected for the NHIS 2020 for a select group of participants who completed the 2019 and 2020 survey is recommended. This study advances positive social change by providing multiple stakeholders with health equity outcome findings among adults with cardiometabolic conditions.