Women, Work, and Preventive Health Care

Abstract

This study's purpose is to ex lore the possibility of P competing roles (paid employment and chi dcare responsibilities) impinging upon women's annual Pap, breast and blood pressure screenings, and whether HMO enrollments further reventive health care for women in different situations. Usin data rom the National a P Access to Medical Care Survey of 1982, t e sample includes 594 women who are HMO patients, and 2765 women having regular sources of care from providers in other settings. The findings mdia t e a strong association between women's relative financial responsibilities for their families and their use of preventive health services. Women who live in traditional situations (no employment outside the home, su ported b a male) and women who share the financial burden wit k' men (t K e "new" multiple-earner families) have substantially more Pap and breast examinations, respectively, than non-traditional family women who carry the full burden themselves. However, these latter women were more likely to have had blood pressure screening- the least ex ensive, most convenient procedure of those studied. Overall, HM 8 s did not increase preventive care for traditional family women, did help in marginally boosting the breast examinations of women who share financial responsibility with men, and in the blood pressure screenings for women in nontraditional families. The conclusions stress the importance of measures of women's employment in examining access to care, and call for closer scrutiny of HMOs' preventive care protocols for particularly vulnerable clients.