How did unmet care needs during the pandemic affect health outcomes of older European individuals?

Abstract

The first wave of the COVID-19 pandemic left many people with unmet health care needs, which could have detrimental effects on their health. This paper examines the effects of these unmet needs during the first wave of the pandemic on health outcomes one year later. We combine two waves of the SHARE survey collected during the COVID-19 pandemic (in June/July 2020 and 2021), as well as four waves collected before the pandemic. Our health outcomes are four dummy variables: fatigue, falling, fear of falling and dizziness/faints/blackouts issues. Finally, we use OLS regression with individual and time fixed effects for our difference-in-difference analysis, as well as a doubly robust estimator to condition the parallel trend assumption on pre-pandemic covariates. We find substantial effects of having had unmet healthcare needs during 2020 on the probability of having trouble with fatigue and fear of falling one year later. We particularly find strong effects for general practitioner (GP) and specialist care, and in lower extent of physiotherapist, psychotherapist, and rehabilitation care.