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Health Disparities

Population-specific differences in access to quality health care, whether caused by gender, race, geography, environment, or other factors, can affect individual and community health. RAND research aims to understand the causes of—and thereby reduce disparities in—health outcomes, access, and care at the individual, community, and international levels.

Journal Article

Journal Article

Development of a Long-Term Evaluation Framework for the National Standards for Culturally and Linguistically Appropriate Services (CLAS) in Health and Health Care

RAND was awarded a contract by HHS OMH to develop the long-term evaluation framework for the National CLAS Standards. This report presents the details of the development of the framework.

Jun 30, 2020
Journal Article

Journal Article

Evaluation of the National CLAS Standards: Tips and Resources

OMH commissioned the development of a framework and toolkit to guide efforts to evaluate the National CLAS Standards across four settings: ambulatory care, behavioral health, hospitals, and public health.

Jun 30, 2020
Content

RAND Research on Racial Equity

We're launching a new research center dedicated to issues of social justice and racial equity, among other initiatives. In the meantime, we're highlighting a small sample of RAND research that addresses this challenge from a variety of angles.

Jun 25, 2020
Announcement

A Statement by Michael D. Rich

Everyone must do more to eliminate racial inequities. At RAND, we will contribute by continuously strengthening our research and analysis on health, education, justice, security, and well-being. We must examine where these areas intersect, listen more to voices that are too often underrepresented, and integrate the historical and structural contexts in which policies have been developed and applied.

Jun 3, 2020
Commentary

Do We Know How to Treat Alcohol Misuse in Women?

Despite the many clinical trials that have demonstrated the effectiveness and safety of treatments for alcohol use disorder, we still know little about whether men and women respond differently to treatment. Without knowing whether recommended treatments are effective for women, women are vulnerable to the consequences of alcohol misuse.

Apr 29, 2020
Commentary

Women and COVID-19: Studying the Impact of Sex and Gender

Much of current medical evidence is based largely on men. The current COVID-19 pandemic presents a unique opportunity to examine the potential value of asking questions about sex and gender differences to inform ongoing policy decisions.

Apr 13, 2020
Commentary

Incarceration Rates: A Key Measure of Health in America

There's widespread agreement that incarceration has adverse effects on health and health equity, not just for prisoners but also for families and communities. That's one important reason why incarceration in the United States needs to be reduced.

Apr 3, 2020
Journal Article

Journal Article

Healthcare Utilization Among Migrants to the UK: Cross-Sectional Analysis of Two National Surveys

Researchers explored health service utilization among migrants to the UK, adjusting for age, sex, long-term health conditions and time since moving to the UK. The study found that healthcare use was lower among migrants than the UK-born population.

Apr 1, 2020
Journal Article

Journal Article

Advancing LGBTQ Health Equity Via Human-Centered Design

Human-centered design (HCD; also known as user-centered design) is well-suited to advance the field of substance use prevention interventions for LGBTQ youths by designing interventions that simultaneously target several the complex, multilevel factors that drive health disparities.

Feb 4, 2020
Journal Article

Journal Article

Urban Religious Congregations' Responses to Community Substance Use: An Exploratory Study of Four Cases

This paper explores the characteristics of congregation-based substance abuse disorder treatment programs in a diverse sample of urban religious congregations.

Oct 22, 2019
Journal Article

Journal Article

Using Ancillary Sociodemographic Data to Identify Sexual Minority Adults Among Those Responding "Something Else" or "Don't Know" to Sexual Orientation Questions

Using National Health Interview Survey data, this article compares three analytic strategies for using "something else" and "don't know" responses to estimate health disparities for sexual minorities.

Sep 19, 2019
Blog

DMZ Meeting, Students with Disabilities, Iran: RAND Weekly Recap

This weekly recap focuses on Trump's meeting with Kim Jong Un, supporting students with disabilities, the flawed logic of a proportional response in Iran, and more.

Jul 5, 2019
Essay

How Pittsburgh Is Addressing Social and Economic Disparities

Pittsburgh has been taking a hard look at race, wealth, and opportunity. In partnership with RAND, the city has run and published its numbers on subjects ranging from police contacts to business ownership to graduation rates as part of a commitment to do better.

Jul 2, 2019
Journal Article

Journal Article

Rural-Urban Disparities in Access to Home- and Community-Based Services and Supports: Stakeholder Perspectives From 14 States

This paper presents findings from a qualitative study examining the impact of the Medicaid Balancing Incentive Program. The analysis in this paper examines factors associated with rural disparities in access to home and community-based services.

Jun 26, 2019
Journal Article

Journal Article

Overt Perceived Discrimination and Racial Microaggressions and Their Association with Health Risk Behaviors Among a Sample of Urban American Indian/Alaska Native Adolescents

Analyzing the potential effects of the broad range of perceived discrimination (PD) experiences, including both overt PD and racial microaggressions, among urban American Indian/Alaska Native adolescents on health outcomes offers a unique opportunity to further our understanding of these health disparities.

Jun 12, 2019
Journal Article

Sexual Minority Disparities in Opioid Misuse, Perceived Heroin Risk and Heroin Access Among a National Sample of US Adults

LGB opioid disparities varied significantly by sexual identity &gender. All LGB subgroups had elevated lifetime pain reliever misuse. Bisexual women uniquely had elevated OUD rates and lifetime injection heroin use.

Jun 12, 2019
Journal Article

Journal Article

Systematic Review: United States Workforce for Autism-Related Child Healthcare Services

The 33 studies reviewed identify multiple workforce-related challenges for families seeking treatment for children with autism spectrum disorder-including lack of primary care providers to serve these children, lack of specialty providers, and sociodemographic and geographic disparities in access to ASD services.

Jun 10, 2019
Journal Article

Journal Article

The Effect of Medicaid Waivers on Ameliorating Racial/Ethnic Disparities Among Children With Autism

Increasing Medicaid waivers to include more services for children with autism spectrum disorder has the potential to ameliorate well-documented black-white disparities in treatment.

May 29, 2019
Journal Article

Journal Article

Pittsburgh Equity Indicators: A Baseline Measurement for Enhancing Equity in Pittsburgh

The Pittsburgh Equity Indicators assess annual progress toward equitable opportunities and outcomes for Pittsburghers of all races, genders, and incomes. The 2017 report summarizes baseline equality scores, which measure disparities in Pittsburgh.

Apr 24, 2019
Journal Article

Pittsburgh Equity Indicators: A Baseline Measurement for Enhancing Equity in Pittsburgh

The 2018 Pittsburgh Equity Indicators report in enables the comparison of two years of data to measure change in disparities. The report includes information on equality scores for 2017 and 2018, as well as "change scores" between years.

Apr 24, 2019

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