Identifying Accessibility Requests for Patients With Disabilities Through an Electronic Health Record-Based Questionnaire

IMPORTANCE People with disabilities experience disparities in health care access and outcomes, and inaccessible health care facilities are major barriers to health care access. Methods to collect accessibility request information are needed to improve health care outcomes for patients with disabilities. OBJECTIVE To evaluate an electronic health record (EHR)-based questionnaire designed to identify accessibility requests for patients with disabilities at an eye clinic. DESIGN, SETTING, AND PARTICIPANTS This cross-sectional pilot study implemented an EHR questionnaire and prospectively collected data on accessibility requests at a university-based eye clinic. The study included 55 722 patients making appointments at the Johns Hopkins Wilmer Eye Institute from April 1, 2019, to March 31, 2020. MAIN OUTCOMES AND MEASURES The Wilmer Eye Institute staff were trained to assess accessibility requests of patients making appointments in-person or via telephone using a standardized script and entering patient responses into the EHR. Data were later extracted for analysis and used to determine the proportion of patients making eye appointments who reported a disability accessibility request (physical, sensory, or intellectual) during their clinic visit. RESULTS Accessibility request data were collected from 250 932 patient encounters. Patients had a mean (SD) age of 61.9 (20.6) years; most were women (146 846 [58.5%]) and were White individuals (162 720 (64.9%]). Of these, 23 510 (9.4%) encounters were associated with an accessibility request. The most reported accessibility request was mobility related (18 857 [7.5%]) (needing a cane, crutches, motorized scooter, walker, wheelchair, stretcher, assistance standing, or transport services), followed by sensory-related (2988 [1.2%]) (visual, hearing, or speech impairment), intellectual (353 [0.1%]), and other (1312 [0.5%]) (assistance with filling forms or service animal) requests. Patients with an accessibility request compared with those without, were older (72.6 vs 60.8 years), less likely to be White individuals (59.7% vs 65.4%), and more likely to be women (62.6% vs 58.1%), receiving Medicare (69.6% vs 41.5%), and have vision impairment (41.3% vs 13.6%) (P < .001 for all). CONCLUSIONS AND RELEVANCE In this cross-sectional study, a substantial proportion of patients making eye appointments reported having accessibility requests as captured using a new EHR-based questionnaire. Such standardization of data collection for disability-related accessibility requests in EHR is scalable, could be expanded to other clinical settings, and has the potential to improve accessibility of health care interactions for patients with disabilities.