Alex D Federman

..Despite its potential to improve access to primary care, the QMB program is underused. Future policy and research efforts should address low participation rates...

..This may, in turn, reduce beneficiaries' out-of-pocket prescription costs, thereby improving patients' access to medications and possibly their medication adherence and health outcomes as well...

..Empirical research and health policies on asthma have focused on children and young adults, even though asthma morbidity and mortality are higher among older asthmatics...

..To study the relationship between health literacy and memory and verbal fluency in older adults...

..To create a brief assessment tool, the Medication Understanding and Use Self-Efficacy Scale (MUSE)...

..National-level data are needed on predictors of mild physical impairment among older adults to assist policy makers with resource allocation...

..Asthma is a growing cause of morbidity for elderly Americans and is highly prevalent among Hispanic people in the United States. The inability to speak English poses a barrier to patient-provider communication...

..To examine the relationship between suboptimal asthma beliefs and inadequate health literacy among older adults with asthma...

..These findings suggest that a significant number of eligible elderly are not enrolled in Medicaid and that liberalizing or tightening Medicaid eligibility criteria can have an impact on Medicaid enrollment by low-income elderly patients...

..to examine the association of language (English vs Spanish), and commonly used measures of memory and word fluency among older adults...

..Physicians play a key role in determining use of generics and specialty may be a particularly influential factor...

..This study aimed to characterize seniors' beliefs about generic drugs, and examine potential correlates of these beliefs, including socioeconomic and health status variables, health literacy, and physician communication skills...

..To examine agreement between self-report of chronic disease and medical record data for inner-city seniors, their sensitivity and specificity, and the association between patient characteristics and accuracy of self-reports...

..To examine the impact of depressive symptoms on asthma outcomes and medication adherence in inner-city elderly patients with asthma...

..Medicare established the Physicians Quality Reporting Initiative (PQRI, recently renamed the Physicians Quality Reporting System) to increase reporting of quality metrics and promote healthcare quality...

..To determine whether literacy mediates the association between education, hypertension knowledge and control...

..9, 95% CI 2.2 to 21.9) or HIV (RR 5.6, 95% CI 1.7 to 18.5). Successfully promoting appropriate utilization of onsite primary care may require a better understanding of MMTP patients' perceptions of primary care...

..Lack of awareness may be a significant barrier to participation by low- and middle-income seniors in pharmaceutical cost-assistance programs...

..The objective of this study was to determine whether the overuse and misuse of health care services in the ambulatory setting has decreased in the past decade...

..Several strategies have been proposed to reform physician reimbursement while improving quality of care. Despite much debate, physicians' opinions regarding reimbursement reform proposals have not been objectively assessed...

..Study Design: Cross-sectional study using data from the National Ambulatory Medical Care Survey...

..A significant minority of physicians were either providing HCV antiviral treatment or willing to provide HCV antiviral treatment...

..Elderly patients, in particular, have disproportionately low rates of adequate pain control compared with younger patients...

..To determine whether low-income seniors and those without prescription drug coverage are more likely to use generic cardiovascular drugs than more affluent and better insured adults...

..The career development plan includes didactic courses, expert advising, and mentored research to develop skills in qualitative and survey research methods, and to expand the candidate's clinical geriatrics knowledge base. ..