By Lisa Watts
LTSS Center fellows Jane Tavares and Marc Cohen are co-authors of a recent report exploring the availability of person-centered care.
Nearly one in four (24%) Hispanic older adults and 17% of Black older adults report never having their health preferences considered by health care clinicians. These figures compare with 7% of older white adults who report the same experience.
Individuals who report that their clinicians never account for their preferences are twice as likely to have incomes below the Federal Poverty Level (23.5%), compared to those who report clinicians always take their preferences into account (12.3%).
These and other findings are shared in Person-Centered Care: Why Taking Individuals’ Care Preferences into Account Matters, a new report from the LeadingAge LTSS Center @UMass Boston and the Center for Consumer Engagement in Health Innovation at Community Catalyst.
The report, which also explores practice and policy solutions to increase the availability of person-centered care, was co-authored by LTSS Center fellows Jane Tavares and Marc Cohen; Ann Hwang, former director of the Center for Consumer Engagement in Health Innovation at Community Catalyst; and Frances Hawes, assistant professor of health care administration at the University of Wisconsin, Eau Claire.
Some people view person-centered care—which takes the whole person into account and aims to address individuals’ preferences, needs, and values—as a “nice to have” feature of the healthcare system, but not something that is critical to the delivery of high-quality care, notes Cohen, who is co-director of the LTSS Center.
“This study and our prior study show that’s not really the case,” he says. “When people feel they are not being listened to, or that their preferences aren’t being met, bad things happen. You have bad health outcomes and projected higher healthcare costs.”
Read more at the Gerontology Institute Blog.