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Abstract #149798

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Anantachai Panjamapirom, MS, MBA, School of Health Professions/ PhD in Administration - Health Services, University of Alabama at Birmingham, Webb 564, 1530 3rd Ave S., Birmingham, AL 35294-3361, 205-934-3113, apirom@uab.edu and Warren Martin, PhD, School of Business/ Department of Management, Marketing and Industrial Distribution, University of Alabama at Birmingham, BEC 209, 1530 3rd Ave S., Birmingham, AL 35294-3361.

Among various predicaments in the healthcare environment, healthcare disparities have become one of the most critical concerns that researchers, practitioners, and policy makers have studied and searched for a remedy. While racial, ethnic, gender, and socioeconomic disparities in health care have been extensively documented, some evidence demonstrates that aging or age-related disparities in health care are a significant emerging trend that merits increased attention (Majeed and Cook, 1996; Bowling et al, 2000; Gurwitz et al, 2001; Madan et al, 2001; Hajjar et al, 2002; Jazieh and Buncher, 2002; Jerant et al, 2004). Researchers have focused their studies on various aspects of aging disparities, such as healthcare access, the relationship and communication between the health care provider and patient, and the delivery of certain diagnostic procedures and treatment interventions (Jerant et al, 2004). However, there is a paucity of applications of theoretical models to explain and predict disparities. This paper proposes a theoretical model that could be utilized to explicate the concepts and elucidate the logic of the aging disparities in health care. The authors specifically employ the shared medical decision-making model as a basic framework on which the model is built. The concepts and law-like generalizations are defined and discussed. Two sets of reconstruction of explanations will be provided to summarize the underlying logic and illustrate the flow of components of the proposed model. A set of propositions is identified for the purpose of testing the model.

Learning Objectives:

• Develop a theoretical framework that explains the phenomenon of aging disparities in health care
• Apply the steps in developing a theoretical framework from the scientific inquiry perspective to aging disparities in health care
• Specify the concepts of shared medical decision-making and its effects on aging disparities in health care

Keywords: Aging, Health Disparities

Presenting author's disclosure statement:

Any relevant financial relationships? No
Any institutionally-contracted trials related to this submission?

I agree to comply with the American Public Health Association Conflict of Interest and Commercial Support Guidelines, and to disclose to the participants any off-label or experimental uses of a commercial product or service discussed in my presentation.

• Slides (pdf) or Handout