title: Racial and ethnic comparisons of nursing home residents at admission.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  To present racial/ethnic comparisons of comprehensive profiles of nursing home residents at admission, including whites, African Americans, Hispanics, Asians/Pacific Islanders, and American Indians/Alaska Natives.
  
  
  METHODS
  More than 885,000 admission assessments recorded in the national Minimum Data Set (MDS) were analyzed. Racial and ethnic analyses of the MDS admission assessments were conducted using the software package SAS.
  
  
  RESULTS
  There were significant racial/ethnic differences in gender and age, with minority residents more likely to be male and younger. African American, Hispanic, and Asian/Pacific Islanders were significantly more likely than white residents to exhibit total dependence in the self-performance of the ADLs and to have greater cognitive impairments, with Asian/Pacific Islanders the most physically dependent and cognitively impaired.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  The results illustrate significant and substantive differences among the racial/ethnic groups for many demographic characteristics, as well as health-related indicators and conditions. This analysis suggests that the general perspective that economically disadvantaged minorities enter nursing homes in worse condition than whites is too simplistic. More research, particularly qualitative studies of specific minority groups, will advance our understanding of why members of some racial/ethnic groups require nursing home placement sooner than other groups.
authors.affiliation: Department of Political Science and Public Administration, Mississippi State University, Mississippi State, MS 39762, USA. rjb161@ps.msstate.edu
authors.forename: Robert J
authors.initials: RJ
authors.lastname: Buchanan
authors.forename: Mark
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Rosenthal
authors.forename: David R
authors.initials: DR
authors.lastname: Graber
authors.forename: Suojin
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Wang
authors.forename: Myung Suk
authors.initials: MS
authors.lastname: Kim
mesh_terms: D000368:Aged; D000369:Aged, 80 and over; D005006:Ethnicity; D005260:Female; D006304:Health Status; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D009735:Nursing Homes / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D010343:Patient Admission; D044469:Racial Groups