HCP Professor John Z. Ayanian, MD, MPP—whose research focuses in part on the effect of patients’ race, ethnicity, and insurance coverage on access to care and clinical outcomes—recently testified on Capitol Hill. Speaking before the House Ways & Means Subcommittee on Health at a hearing on “The Instability of Health Coverage in the United States,” Ayanian discussed his research on the health consequences for Americans who lack insurance and the persistent problem of racial and ethnic disparities in the US health care system. Ayanian’s testimony is available on the Ways and Means Committee website. The health08.org website of the Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation covered the hearing in its Kaiser Daily Health Policy Report.

Ayanian and HCP colleagues have recently published two important articles on these topics: “Health of Previously Uninsured Adults After Acquiring Medicare Coverage,” in the Journal of the American Medical Association, and “Use of Health Services by Previously Uninsured Medicare Beneficiaries,” in the New England Journal of Medicine.