The Value of Completing Annual Wellness Visits Over Time Among Older Adults Living in Low-Income Senior Housing

BACKGROUND: Medicare initiated the Annual Wellness Visit (AWV) in 2011 to encourage the use of preventive care, identify treatment opportunities, and improve health behaviors among older adults. Low-income and minority older adults receive AWVs at lower rates than other Medicare beneficiaries. There is limited evidence regarding the potential benefits of an AWV, particularly for those older adults least likely to receive it. OBJECTIVE: This descriptive longitudinal study evaluated the use of the AWV among 120 older adults living in low-income senior housing who completed 2 Annual Wellness Visits over a 3-year period. METHODS: Chi-square and repeated measures analyses were done to evaluate differences in AWV items over time. RESULTS: Residents were 79.0 years old on average, mostly female (77%), Black (71%), non-Hispanic (75%), not married (82%), had high school or greater education (90%), had on average 4.6 (SD = 2.6) comorbidities, and took 5.3 (SD = 3.9) medications. Findings demonstrated consistently low rates of physical activity, moderate rates of smoking, and about half of residents reporting forgetting to take medications. Significant changes over the 2 years indicated cognitive decline, increases in feelings of unsteadiness, dizziness, and experiencing urinary incontinence, but no increase in falls. There was a significant increase in the completion of advance directives and decreases in alcohol consumption and emergency room usage. CONCLUSION: This study demonstrates the value of AWVs to identify health behaviors and needed interventions to increase physical activity and balance, decrease smoking behavior, improve medication adherence, maintain cognition, and address urinary incontinence among low-income senior housing residents.