Report Finds “Sharp” Healthcare Disparities among States

​The Commonwealth Fund’s Scorecard on State Health System Performance for Low-Income Populations, 2013, found “sharp health care disparities among states,” according to Health Care in the Two Americas, a September 2013 report from the Commonwealth Fund. The scorecard evaluated states based on 30 indicators in four domains: access, prevention and quality of care, potentially avoidable hospital use, and health outcomes. The best-performing states were Hawaii, Wisconsin, Vermont, Minnesota, Massachusetts, and Connecticut. The states in the lowest quartile were mostly in Southern or South Central states, which also had the highest rates of poverty. For low-income populations, a fourfold difference in key health indicators was observed between the best- and worst-performing states. For those with high incomes, the variation among states was less striking.