Medicare Beneficiaries' Attitudes About Seeking Health Care: 1996

The Medicare Current Beneficiary Survey (MCBS) is a powerful tool for analyzing the Medicare population. Based on a stratified random sample, we can derive information about the health care use, expenditure, and financing of Medicare's 36 million enrollees. We can also learn about those enrollees' health status, living arrangements, and access to and satisfaction with care. Figures 1 and 2 compare the attitudes of Medicare beneficiary regarding the use of health care services with their actual use of different types of service. In the fall of 1996, non-institutionalized beneficiaries were asked to respond true or false to the following statements: "You worry about your health more than other people your age," "You will do just about anything to avoid going to the doctor," "When you are sick, you try to keep it to yourself," "Usually, you go to the doctor as soon as you start to feel bad." Figure 1 compares responses to these questions with whether the beneficiary used any emergency room, outpatient hospital or doctor services during the year. Figure 2 compares beneficiary attitudes about medical care with their use of preventative services during the year.