Description

For all persons eligible for the Access to Care section with a usual source of care provider (USUALPL), USCMEDTYP reports whether the person's usual source of care provider is located in an office, a hospital but not the emergency room, or a hospital emergency room.

USCMEDTYP is collected as part of the Access to Care section, which gathers information on usual source of care for all family members, characteristics of usual source of care health providers, and barriers family members have faced in obtaining needed health care. Please see USCPRFAC for all variables pertaining to the characteristics of the respondent's usual source of care and ACCESSELIG for more information about the Access to Care section.

IPUMS MEPS reports the universe for each variable based on a thorough review of the original MEPS documentation. Investigating the data may reveal cases that do not meet the stated universe. Users are encouraged to validate universes for their analyses.

Comparability

Users may note a significant increase in the frequency of "Unknown - don't know" beginning in 2018. According to the 2018 MEPS documentation, this is "due to the design change of CAPI and the functionality of the provider look-up" (C-70, C-71). Users should also note that the Access to Care variables are not designed to yield full-year estimates in 1997, as the section is only administered in Round 2 instead of Rounds 2 and 4. The 1997 AHRQ documentation advises that "The 1997 Access to Care variables cannot be used to make full-year estimates, but can be useful in such analyses as trend analyses, or for enhancing subgroup analyses. These variables may be of particular interest because of the 1997 oversample of populations (such as poverty, children with activity limitations, adults with functional limitations, high medical expenditure cases, and the elderly) where access issues are particularly relevant" (C-16). Because USCMEDTYP is only collected in Round 2 in 1997 instead of Rounds 2 and 4, USCMEDTYP cannot be used to make a full-year estimate in 1997. Otherwise, this variable is comparable over time.

Universe

Availability

• 1996-2022

Weights

• 1996-2022 : PERWEIGHT

Flags