Release Date
Geography
Language of Resource
Full Text Available
Open Access / OK to Reproduce
Peer Reviewed
Objective
This study estimates the effects of county-level social isolation, concentrated disadvantage, and income inequality on older adults' risk of OUD using longitudinal data analysis.
Findings/Key points
The relationship between county-level social isolation and OUD is driven by non-Hispanic whites, while Hispanic beneficiaries are less sensitive to the changes in county-level factors than any other racial ethnic groups. Between 2013 and 2018, US older adults’ risk of opioid use disorder (OUD) was associated with both ecological and individual factors, which carries implications for intervention.
Design/methods
We merged the 2013–2018 Medicare population (aged 65+) data to the American Community Survey 5-year county-level estimates to create a person-year dataset (N = 47,291,217 person-years) and used conditional logit fixed-effects modeling to test whether changes in individual- and county-level covariates alter older adults' risk of OUD.
