Have We Come Up Short? A Comparison of the Unmet Health Care Needs among U.S.-Born and Foreign-Born Adults

Stephanie Howe, Pennsylvania State University

Using data from Panels 12 and 13 (2007-2009) of the Medical Expenditure Panel Survey (n=19,562 adults), this study addressed two goals. First, I determined whether immigrants had greater unmet medical need than the U.S. born, after accounting for group differences in demographic risk factors, available resources, and family context. Second, I assessed the roles of length of stay in the U.S., English language proficiency, and state-level destination type in explaining the unmet medical need of the foreign-born, controlling for covariates. Logistic regression results for two measures of unmet medical need, subjective and objective, indicated that compared to the U.S. born, immigrants reported less subjective unmet need and equal objective unmet need. Among immigrants only, length of stay in the U.S. and state-level destination type were significantly associated with objective unmet need, but not subjective unmet need. English language proficiency was not significantly related to either measure of unmet medical need.