Specialist Care for Alzheimer's Is Tough to Find for Poorer, Rural Americans

New research in the Journal of General Internal Medicine suggests poor rural patients with Alzheimer's disease may lack access to experts who could identify the first signs of memory declines, reports Medical Xpress . The authors aimed to learn whether Medicare beneficiaries with Alzheimer's and related dementias were getting care from specialized geriatric providers, and whether there were socioeconomic disparities in care access. They used the Southern Community Cohort Study, which enrolled roughly 85,000 people, aged 40 to 79, in 12 southeastern U.S. states between 2002 and 2009. A predominantly low-income population was the source of data. The researchers tracked 10,380 participants who had turned 65 by 2016, of whom 1,295 had at least one Medicare claim indicating Alzheimer's disease and related disorders between 1999 and 2016. People with these conditions and incomes above $24,999 were more likely to have seen a geriatric specialist than those earning less than $15,000, while the chances of having at least one visit were lower for those in non-metropolitan areas. "When we're thinking about how to improve care for these populations, we really need to think about how we increase access for these lower socioeconomic groups," said University of Minnesota Professor and lead study author Sayeh Nikpay.