Racial/ethnic disparities in disability outcomes among post-acute home care patients.

OBJECTIVE

To examine activities of daily living (ADL) disability outcomes among racially/ethnically diverse elders receiving home care (HC) after hospitalization.

METHOD

We conducted a retrospective cohort analysis of single-agency, 2013-2014 Outcome and Assessment Information Set data from older adults who received post-hospitalization HC ( n = 20,674). We measured overall change in ADL disability by summing the difference of standardized admission and discharge scores from nine individual ADL. Associations between race/ethnicity and overall ADL change scores were modeled using general linear regression, adjusting for covariates consistent with the Disablement Model.

RESULTS

Overall, patients experienced improvement in ADL disability from HC admission to discharge. However, Asian, African American, and Hispanic patients experienced significantly less improvement compared with non-Hispanic Whites (all p < .001), even after controlling for covariates.

DISCUSSION

Racial/ethnic disparities exist in ADL disability improvement among HC patients. Research is needed to clarify mechanisms underlying these disparities. Disablement Model factors may be targets for clinical intervention.