Insurance-Provided Grocery Assistance and Health Care Outcomes Among Patients With Diabetes

To examine the association between a health insurance plan offering a grocery assistance benefit to members with diabetes and their health care use and outcomes.

This retrospective, observational study used administrative claims to examine the associations of receiving grocery assistance provided by a health plan and health care use among patients with diabetes. A new health plan with low premiums and a grocery benefit (the intervention) was offered to a select group of members in 2021 and 2022. The intervention group examined in this study was made up of members with diabetes who selected the new health plan with the grocery benefit; the control group consisted of members with diabetes who were eligible for but chose not to select the new health plan with the grocery benefit.

We used a doubly robust inverse probability weighted difference-in-differences design to analyze the impact on health care use, including inpatient and outpatient utilization and medication adherence, and on health outcomes, including those related to diabetes complications.

The intervention group saw an associated decrease of 3.1 percentage points in the prevalence of diabetes with complications. We also found significant associated increases in adherence to diabetes medications. No significant associated changes in health care service utilization or other health outcomes were observed.

Providing low-touch grocery assistance to members with diabetes improved management of diabetes complications. The findings suggest that integrating nutritional benefits into health plans may enhance health outcomes without increasing overall health care utilization. Further research is needed to explore the long-term impact and scalability of such interventions.