Health and a residential care population

This article describes the health status of 234 severely mentally ill (SMI) persons residing in California's supervised residential care facilities in 1973. Relocated in 1983, 63.2% reported their health as good to excellent. Over the follow-up period 80.8% maintained their SSI benefits, insuring them of health insurance coverage. Surprisingly the follow-up sample, believed to be at high risk of increased physical morbidity, compared quite favorably to low income subsamples of the National Health Interview Survey (NHIS). The SMI reported better health, access to and utilization of health services. Differences were particularly striking in the poor health category with NHIS respondents reporting poor health 3.5 times more frequently than SMI sample numbers. These results offer some support for the contribution of health insurance benefits and supervised residential settings to positive health outcomes of this vulnerable population.