Archives

Children's Health Across the 50 States

A great many children in all 50 states receive health care funded by the federal government. While child health is a major agenda item for state officials, many states struggle more than others in addressing this priority.  The Commonwealth Fund Commission recently examined the performance of each state using the State Scorecard on Health System Performance, concluding that access to health care - as well as health care quality, costs, outcomes, and equity - vary widely among states, creating numerous opportunities for improvement.

The Commission's report, U.S. Variations in Child Health System Performance: A State Scorecard, focuses on 13 key indicators of child health and provides specific improvement goals; Indiana ranked in the second quartile among all states, based on dimensions of access, quality, cost, healthy lives, and equity. The report also assesses individual state performance compared with what is achievable, based on benchmarks drawn from the reported performance of all states.

Click here to access the complete study.