Communities to get $300M to tackle health inequalities

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WASHINGTON (AP) — In Memphis, black Medicare beneficiaries are nearly six times as likely as whites to have a leg amputated, a complication stemming from vascular disease and diabetes.

In Mississippi, 57% of women aged 65-69 got mammograms in a two-year period versus 74% in Maine.

And, in Alaska, 71% of Medicare patients with diabetes got an important annual test for blood sugar compared with 91% in Vermont.

Reducing such racial and regional disparities, detailed by researchers at Dartmouth Medical School, will be a major focus of a $300 million initiative to be announced Thursday by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. The program, targeting 14 communities and regions around the country, seeks to improve the quality of health care and to eventually provide models for national health reform.

Dartmouth researchers say that one goal of the project is to cut down on hospital admissions for certain medical conditions. Discretionary stays in the hospital pose a risk to patients and a substantial cost to society.

USA Today