RESEARCH ARTICLE Individual education, area r

share of the disparities in mortality are due to20817 MD, USA Full list of author information is available at the end of the articleBackground Socioeconomic status (SES) has been associated with mortality and incident coronary heart disease [1-3], and the Medicare entitlement program seeks to mitigate some of these SES differentials by providing universal access to healthcare to US citizens aged 65 years or more. However, residing in areas with fewer economic resources may delay care for acute illness or impact the ability to receive routine or follow-up care. Further, des-pite Medicare’s aspect of universal care, individual level SES may still impact health outcomes among the elderly through a variety of potential social-behavioral pathways such as chronic stress, a lack of social networks, and ac-cess to health information. Although socio-economic status has been shown to be related to all-cause mortal-ity regardless of underlying disease [4], a disproportion