Dovepress Table 1 sample description Variable Chinese Filipino Korean Vietnamese Perceived mental health need Did not perceive mental health need saw a mental health specialist Did not see a mental health specialist Age (M, sD) Physician contacts (M, sD) n 379 272 247 293 116 1075 37 1154 63.0 (8.97) 4.9 (12.4) Abbreviations: M, mean; sD, standard deviation. Weighted size Weighted percentage 260,212 249,362 82,420 84,452 46,940 620,507 12,888 654,559 39.0 36.0 12.3 12.7 7.0 93.0 1.9 98.1 status were also noted, 89.2% of older Vietnamese Americans were in fair health, compared with 72.1% of Korean Ameri- cans and 61.2% of Chinese and Filipino Americans. Among enabling factors, a high discrepancy of uninsurance was observed among the Asian ethnic groups; one in three older Korean Americans were uninsured, more than twice the frequency of the other three groups. A higher proportion of Chinese Americans were aged over 65 years compared with 38% of Filipino Americans and approximately 31% of Korean and Vietnamese Americans. The results of the linear regression model testing the moderating effects that physician visits had on older Asian Americans’ perception of mental health need are presented in Table 3. The results (F(df = 13) = 12.49, P , 0.0001) provide support for the study’s test hypothesis that the Table 2 Group-specific weighted bivariate analyses from the 2001 California health Interview survey Chinese 4.1 (5.6) Filipino 5.5 (16.5) Korean 4.5 (8.3) Vietnamese 5.8 (6.2) 63.4 (9.5) 63.5 (10.2) 62.0 (7.5) 61.2 (8.4) 1.7 (1.4) 2.5 (1.3) 1.5 (.8) 1.3 (.85) 43.7 46.1 8.9 90.7 87.2 61.2 4.2 0.9 38.1 42.3 11.3 93.2 95.4 61.2 6.0 2.0 30.8 42.9 34.7 86.2 98.3 72.1 5.6 1.1 31.4 45.1 16.3 94.6 100.0 89.2 20.0 5.8 Characteristic Physician contacts (M, sD) Age (M, sD) English proficiency (M, sD) Over 65 years of age (%)a Male Uninsureda Living with othersb Foreign borna Fair healtha Perceived mental healtha Mental health specialist useb Notes: aP , 0.0001; bP , 0.05. Abbreviations: M, mean; sD, standard deviation. Clinical Interventions in Aging 2010:5 Physician contact by older Asian Americans Table 3 Linear regression results for the number of physician contacts Variable b (SE) t-test P-value Intercept 9.67 (3.23) 3.00 0.0036 Male gender 0.86 (0.82) 1.06 0.2942 Over 65 years of age −0.53 (0.97) 0.55 0.5833 Asian ethnic group Filipino 1.55 (1.76) 0.88 0.3825 Korean 0.87 (0.67) 1.31 0.1937 (reference: Chinese/Vietnamese) Uninsured −2.96 (0.98) −3.03 0.0033 Living alone −0.61 (0.54) −1.13 0.2636 Foreign born −2.44 (1.70) −1.44 0.1544 English proficiency −1.30 (0.86) −1.52 0.1332 Fair health −2.47 (0.60) −4.13 0.0001 saw mental health 0.54 (0.79) 0.68 0.5013 professional Perceived mental 2.61 (.73) 3.59 0.0006 health need Perceived mental health need-Asian ethnicity interaction Filipino, perceived −3.76 (1.38) −2.72 0.0081 mental health need Korean, perceived −3.54 (1.50) −2.36 0.0208 mental health need (reference: Chinese/Vietnamese, No perceived mental health need) Abbreviation: se, standard error. perception of mental health need and Asian ethnic back- ground have joint effects. Controlling for covariates, Filipino and Korean Americans who perceived a mental health need had fewer contacts with a physician than the reference category. On average, older Filipino Americans had 3.7 (standard error [SE] = 1.38) fewer contacts, and Korean Americans had 3.5 (SE = 1.50) fewer contacts. In addition, the uninsured had 2.96 (SE = 0.98) fewer contacts with a physician compared with older adults with insurance. Meanwhile older Asian Americans in fair health had 2.47 (SE = 0.60) fewer physician contacts than those in good health. Discussion This study revealed differences in how the perception of mental health need affects the number of older Asian Americans’ physician contacts. Perceiving a mental health need reduces the number of physician visits for Filipino and Korean Americans. Past research using a regional sample compared with non-Hispanic Whites suggests that older Korean Americans’ increased physician use is associated with the presence of perceived physical and mental health conditions6 yet the current findings using state-level data indi- cate that the perception of mental health problems decreases the number of physician visits. submit your manuscript | www.dovepress.com Dovepress 335