Abstract 12487: Healthcare Access and Cardiovascular Risk Factor Management in Low-Income Working-Age Adults After the COVID-19 Pandemic

Abstract

Background: Low-income working age adults disproportionately experienced disruptions in care and deepening financial hardship at the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic. Little is known about how health care access and cardiovascular (CV) risk factor management changed as the pandemic went on, and if these patterns differed by state Medicaid expansion status. Methods: We identified adults aged 18-64 using the CDC’s Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System. Low-income adults were defined as those with incomes <138% of the federal poverty level (FPL), and high-income adults >400% FPL. We fit logistic regression models to compare changes in measures of health care access and CV risk factor management in 2021 to a pre-pandemic baseline (2019), adjusted for age and sex. We included an interaction term for income level and year, to evaluate whether there was a differential change between low- and high-income adults. We also evaluated changes among low-income adults in Medicaid expansion vs. non-expansion states. Results: As shown in the Table , health insurance coverage, access to personal health care provider, and ability to afford care all improved in 2021 compared to pre-pandemic baseline (2019), although gains were more pronounced for high-income vs low-income groups. In contrast, the proportion of adults with a check-up in the past 12 months, or who received recommended cardiovascular risk factor screening, worsened in both low- and high-income groups. Among the low-income group, those in Medicaid expansion states experienced greater increases in insurance coverage than those in non-expansion states (OR 1.53 [1.40,1.68] vs 1.27 [1.11,1.46], p = 0.0283). Conclusion: In this national study, low- and high-income working-age adults experienced decreases in outpatient check-ups and CV risk factor screening in 2021 compared with pre-pandemic baseline. Public health initiatives are needed to improve screening for CV risk factor as the US emerges from the pandemic.