FAIR Health Consumer Access

Coming Soon: FAIR Health Report on National Surveys of Older Adults and Family Caregivers

On February 14, FAIR Health will issue a report on two national surveys. One is a survey of older adults (those aged 65 and older). The other is of family caregivers/care partners. The surveys were carried out as part of a program generously funded by The John A. Hartford Foundation. The surveys concerned the needs of older adults and family caregivers/care partners regarding healthcare navigation and decision making.

In 2021, The John A. Hartford Foundation awarded FAIR Health funding for a project. The project is called “A National Initiative to Advance Cost Information in Shared Decision Making for Serious Health Conditions.” The 18-month program will expand FAIR Health’s shared decision-making tools. In shared decision making, the patient and the healthcare provider discuss the pros and cons of different medical choices. The new program will add four new decision aids related to the care of older adults. The decision aids will have clinical and cost information. They will focus on care for early-stage breast cancer, fast-growing prostate cancer, spinal stenosis and hip osteoarthritis.

FAIR Health also will launch new “total treatment cost” scenarios. These will highlight the range of costs linked to three health problems that affect older people. The health problems are Alzheimer’s disease/dementia, heart failure and major depression. Educational materials and resources will go with these free tools.

For this program, FAIR Health carried out two surveys. One survey, as mentioned, was of adults aged 65 and older. The other was of caregivers/care partners aged 18 and older. The surveys were done with ENGINE Insights. The surveys were fielded in November 2021 and reached 1,005 older patients and 507 caregivers/care partners. Each survey asked about the importance of healthcare costs, attitudes toward shared decision making, navigation of the healthcare system, and more. Here are a few of the findings to be discussed in the report:

• One in four older adults (aged 65 and older) never know the costs of healthcare services before getting a bill. Thirty-two percent of older adults said that they “sometimes” know the costs of healthcare services before getting their bill. But 25 percent of older adults said that they “never” know costs of healthcare services before getting their bills. Twenty-one percent said that knowing their healthcare costs in advance depended on whether the care was given by healthcare providers in their health plan network.
• A significant proportion of older adults think healthcare costs are an important factor when making healthcare decisions. But more than a third find it hard to get such cost information. Thirty-seven percent of older adults felt that healthcare costs are an “important” factor when making healthcare decisions. Twenty-two percent felt that it was the “most important” factor when making healthcare decisions. Sixteen percent of older adults said that healthcare costs were “a thought” when making a healthcare decision. Twenty-four percent said that they do not think about out-of-pocket cost when making a healthcare decision. But 35 percent said that they found getting information about their healthcare costs to be “somewhat hard” or “very hard.”
• A significant proportion of caregivers/care partners think costs are important in making decisions about the person to whom they give care (their care receiver). But most do not talk about costs with healthcare providers. Sixty-four percent of caregivers felt that healthcare costs should be “important” or “very important” to their care receivers’ healthcare providers and/or teams. But only 42 percent said that they discussed those costs with their care receivers’ healthcare providers and/or teams.

The full survey report will be released on fairhealth.org.