Utilization of Healthcare by Immigrants in Canada: A Cross-Sectional Analysis of the Canadian Community Health Survey
Abstract
Immigrants to Canada face unique barriers to health care, which leads to inequities in the utilization of health care. Lower utilization of health care by immigrants to Canada is associated with the deteriorating health of individual immigrants as well as costs to the health care system. The existing literature suggests that time since immigration is an important predictor for utilization of healthcare for Canadian immigrants. This thesis uses Andersen and Newman’s Framework of Health Service Utilization and data from the 2015-2016 Canadian Community Health Survey to examine health care utilization among immigrants in Canada. The objectives were: (1) To examine the relationship between having a regular health care provider and time since immigration, and (2) To examine the relationship between number of medical consultations in the past year and time since immigration. A secondary cross-sectional data analysis was conducted using the 2015-2016 dataset for the Canadian Community Health Survey (CCHS). Eighty four percent of immigrant respondents to CCHS 2015-2016 had a regular health care provider. After controlling for other independent variables, established immigrants (10 or more years since immigration) were 1.75 times more likely to have a regular health care provider compared to recent immigrants (less than 10 years since immigration), confirming the hypothesis. The mean number of medical consultations in the past year for adult immigrant respondents to CCHS 2015-2016 was 3.37±4.53. After controlling for other independent variables, this study found that, contrary to the hypothesis, time since immigration did not have a significant effect on the number of consultations. The patterns of health care utilization for recent and for established immigrants observed in this study may be partially explained by shifting immigration policy, and the economic and social integration of immigrants over time.