Racial and Ethnic Differences in Hypertension-Related Telehealth and In-Person Outpatient Visits Before and During the COVID-19 Pandemic Among Medicaid Beneficiaries

Background:Little is known about the trends and costs of hypertension management through telehealth among individuals enrolled in Medicaid.

Methods:Using MarketScan^® Medicaid database, we examined outpatient visits among people with hypertension aged 18–64 years. We presented the numbers of hypertension-related telehealth and in-person outpatient visits per 100 individuals and the proportion of hypertension-related telehealth outpatient visits to total outpatient visits by month, overall, and by race and ethnicity. For the cost analysis, we presented total and patient out-of-pocket (OOP) costs per visit for telehealth and in-person visits in 2021.

Results:Of the 229,562 individuals, 114,445 (49.9%) were non-Hispanic White, 80,692 (35.2%) were non-Hispanic Black, 3,924 (1.71%) were Hispanic. From February to April 2020, the number of hypertension-related telehealth outpatient visits per 100 persons increased from 0.01 to 6.13, the number of hypertension-related in-person visits decreased from 61.88 to 52.63, and the proportion of hypertension-related telehealth outpatient visits increased from 0.01% to 10.44%. During that same time, the proportion increased from 0.02% to 13.9% for non-Hispanic White adults, from 0.00% to 7.58% for non-Hispanic Black adults, and from 0.12% to 19.82% for Hispanic adults. The average total and patient OOP costs per visit in 2021 were $83.82 (95% confidence interval [CI], 82.66–85.05) and $0.55 (95% CI, 0.42–0.68) for telehealth and $264.48 (95% CI, 258.87–269.51) and $0.72 (95% CI, 0.65–0.79) for in-person visits, respectively.

Conclusions:Hypertension management via telehealth increased among Medicaid recipients regardless of race and ethnicity, during the COVID-19 pandemic. These findings may inform telehealth policymakers and health care practitioners.