In the Emergency Room, Patients’ Unmet Social Needs and Health Needs Converge

From Morning Consult:

Calculations using data from the Healthcare Cost and Utilization Project, the largest collection of longitudinal hospital care data in the United States, show that in 2016, Kentucky, Tennessee, Florida, South Carolina and Missouri saw the highest ratios of total visits to population — but not because their residents are inherently sicker. The analysis found performance on measures that historically fall outside the realm of health care — like education, employment and poverty concentration — had nearly as strong a relationship with ED use as health status.