Cultural competency in health care delivery has been receiving increasing attention among providers, physician groups and health plans serving members that are receiving public health insurance; however , the aforementioned groups are perplexed on how to implement cultural and linguistically competent systems. One step to begin addressing cultural and linguistic competency in health care delivery requires an understanding of the multitude of issues afflicting racial and ethnic groups as well as, identifying barriers to health care delivery within a health plan. Little research is available on low-income populations and issues of culture and language access among members in a large Medicaid Managed Care Plan. L.A. Care Health Plan, the largest Medicaid Managed Care Organization in the nation interviewed members in three languages to understand in a qualitative and quantitative way the barriers to accessing health care. The members were randomly selected by language group. This presentation will focus on the results of this survey. The content areas that members were queried on were: socio-economic barriers, discrimination, transportation, the language and method of delivery of health education information, language barriers, utilization of services, and communication with physicians and medical staff.
Learning Objectives: 1. Participants will learn about the health access issues for low-income populations enrolled in a Public Managed Care Organization. 2. Participants will learn how a manage care organization can respond to the multiple issues related to accessing care for low-income populations from diverse linguistic and cultural backgrounds.
Keywords: Access and Services, Culture
Presenting author's disclosure statement:
Organization/institution whose products or services will be discussed: None
I do not have any significant financial interest/arrangement or affiliation with any organization/institution whose products or services are being discussed in this session.