Unmet Mental Health Care Needs among Asian Americans 10–11 Years After Exposure to the World Trade Center Attack

Winnie W. Kung, Xiaoran Wang, Xinhua Liu, Emily Goldmann and Debbie Huang
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Winnie W. Kung: Fordham University, Graduate School of Social Service, 113 West 60th Street, New York, NY 11375, USA
Xiaoran Wang: Fordham University, Graduate School of Social Service, 113 West 60th Street, New York, NY 11375, USA
Xinhua Liu: Columbia University, Mailman School of Public Health, 722 W 168th Street, New York, NY 10032, USA
Emily Goldmann: New York University, College of Global Public Health, 715/719 Broadway, 10th floor, New York, NY 10003, USA
Debbie Huang: Columbia University, Mailman School of Public Health, 722 W 168th Street, New York, NY 10032, USA

IJERPH, 2019, vol. 16, issue 7, 1-15

Abstract: This study investigated the prevalence of unmet mental health care needs (UMHCN) and their associated factors among 2344 Asian Americans directly exposed to the World Trade Center (WTC) attack 10–11 years afterwards. Given the pervasive underutilization of mental health services among Asians, their subjective evaluation of unmet needs could provide more nuanced information on disparities of service. We used the WTC Health Registry data and found that 12% of Asian Americans indicated UMHCN: 69% attributing it to attitudinal barriers, 36% to cost barriers, and 29% to access barriers. Among all the factors significantly related to UMHCN in the logistic model, disruption of health insurance in the past year had the largest odds ratio (OR = 2.37, 95% confidence interval: 1.61–3.48), though similar to functional impairment due to mental disorders. Post-9/11 mental health diagnosis, probable mental disorder and ≥14 poor mental health days in the past month were also associated with greater odds of UMHCN, while greater social support was associated with lower odds. Results suggest that continued outreach efforts to provide mental health education to Asian communities to increase knowledge about mental illness and treatment options, reduce stigmatization of mental illness, and offer free mental health services are crucial to address UMHCN.

Keywords: unmet mental health care needs; Asian Americans; World Trade Center attack; disaster; mental health conditions; mental health service use; health insurance; social support; stressful life events (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I I1 I3 Q Q5 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2019
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

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