A new study found out that patients suffering from a traumatic injury who have no insurance tend to receive better health care than those who are insured.
The research discovered that uninsured patients who were admitted for traumatic injuries, which include car crashes, gunshots, serious falls, and others, are more likely to be transferred to regional trauma centers than those who have insurance. Transferring the patients to trauma centers increases their probability of surviving the injury by 25 percent, as they receive better care in these facilities than in community hospitals.
To gather data for their study, lead author M. Kit Delgado and his team from Stanford University analyzed the 2009 medical records of at least 4,000 trauma patients who are aged 65 and below and were admitted at 636 hospitals. At most two-thirds of all U.S hospitals are classified as non-trauma hospitals, and 25 percent of these patients were given initial treatment in these facilities.
The study found out that the transfer for patients with traumatic injury occurred nearly 45 percent of the time. However, for patients who have Medicaid, the transfer is 14 percent less probable to happen and for those with private insurance, the transfer is 11 percent less likely to be done.
The researchers clarified that they were not accusing the hospitals of discriminating between those who are insured and not. However, it shows that there may be some case managers who recommend transferring a patient with no insurance yet chose to keep an insured patient with the confidence that they can treat him well.
Delgado admitted that the study's result may be influenced by unreported preferences of the patients. One possible explanation is that some insured patients won't allow the transfer and insist on staying in a familiar hospital. He added that their study did not show if patients who were not transferred to trauma hospitals suffered more because of this decision, but there are some studies that implicates that some patients did suffer by staying in their local hospitals.
This study was published in the Feb. 19 issue of the JAMA Surgery.
