Get Updates
Reducing Racial and Ethnic Disparities in Health Care
Contact: Cheryl Pedersen, (609) 275-2258
WASHINGTON, D.C. (August 3, 2009)—Health plans and employers rarely work together to address racial and ethnic health care disparities in the workforce. However, these types of collaborations can strengthen development of programs to reduce disparities. A new brief from Mathematica Policy Research draws on interviews with large employers, health plan representatives, government officials, and national experts to assess health plan/employer partnerships addressing disparities. The brief also looks at barriers that prevent partnerships from forming and discusses strategies to encourage increased involvement of employers in the future.
Despite the rationale for greater employer involvement in reducing health care disparities, recent evidence suggests that employers are only moderately aware of disparities. Barriers to involving employers in reducing disparities include:
- Lack of awareness of the importance and cost of disparities
- Uncertainty regarding the legality of sharing race and ethnicity data
- Administrative burden and cost
- Skepticism that health plans have the technical sophistication needed to assess and address disparities
In the current economic environment, disparities assessment and reduction is also a secondary priority for employers and health plans alike. Educating employers and employees on the causes and consequences of disparities, promoting the business case for disparities reduction, and creating more national leadership around these issues may elevate disparities reduction as a priority.
“Health plans, purchaser coalitions, and politicians continue to discuss disparities, and more employers recognize disparities as tied to value-based purchasing,” said Patricia Collins Higgins, co-author of the brief and a researcher at Mathematica. “The U.S. population also continues to diversify, so employers are becoming more attuned to the costs of disparities, and collaboration between purchasers and health plans may increase in the future.”
The policy brief, “Reducing Racial and Ethnic Disparities in Health Care: Partnerships Between Employers and Health Plans” by Higgins, Melanie Au, and Erin Fries Taylor, is available at www.mathematica-mpr.com/publications/redirect_pubsdb.asp?strSite=pdfs/Health/reducedisparities.pdf. The brief was part of a larger project for the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality to evaluate the National Health Plan Collaborative.
Mathematica, a nonpartisan research firm, provides a full range of research and data collection services, including program evaluation and policy research, survey design and data collection, research methods and standards, and program management/data system support, to improve public well-being. Its clients include federal and state governments, foundations, and private-sector and international organizations. The employee-owned company, with offices in Princeton, N.J., Ann Arbor, Mich., Cambridge, Mass., Chicago, Ill., Oakland, Calif., and Washington, D.C., has conducted some of the most important studies of health care, education, family support, employment, nutrition, and early childhood policies and programs.