Prevention at the Heart of Keeping Women Healthy Secretary
Kathleen Sebelius 04:58 PM EDT Everyone wants their family to be
healthy. And a key component of this is ensuring that mothers,
daughters, and sisters have access to the preventive services
they need. When it comes to health, women are often the sole
decision maker for their families and the trusted source in
circles of friends – and they are also key consumers of health
care. Women have unique healthcare needs across their life span
and have high rates of chronic disease, including diabetes,
heart disease and stroke. Yet while women are more likely to
need preventive health care services, they often have less
ability to pay. Too often, the combination of women’s lower
incomes and out-of-pocket health costs mean that women forgo
necessary preventive services. But removing cost sharing
requirements improves women’s access to important preventive
services. In fact, one study found that the rate of women
getting a mammogram went up as much as 9 percent w