Description

For all persons eligible for the Access to Care section (ACCESSELIG) with any family member who had difficulty obtaining needed medical care in the past 12 months (DIFCARFM) who provided a main reason for having difficulty obtaining needed care (DIFCARFMY), DIFCARFMYCST reports that family members also had difficulty obtaining care because they could not afford care, in addition to the main problem listed in DIFCARFMY.

DIFCARFMYCST 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. Persons who reported a main problem for their family members' difficulty/delay/non-receipt of needed care were asked to report additional contributing problems, and could report more than one problem as part of this follow-up question. Please see DIFCARFM for all variables describing the family member's difficulty obtaining medical 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 should 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 DIFCARFMYCST is only collected in Round 2 in 1997 instead of Rounds 2 and 4, DIFCARFMYCST cannot be used to make a full-year estimate in 1997. Otherwise, this variable is comparable over time.

Universe

Availability

• 1996-2001

Weights

• 1996-2001 : PERWEIGHT

Flags