LOS ANGELES, June 16 (UPI) -- U.S. children living with many siblings or adults have less access to healthcare and use fewer prescriptions than those in smaller families, a study finds.
The findings are not due to demographic or socioeconomic factors, parental education, child-rearing experience or children's health status, according to study authors Dr. Alex Chen, at Children's Hospital Los Angeles, and Dr. Jose Escarce, at the University of California, Los Angeles.
The authors attribute the results to finite parental resources. "As there are more demands on a parent's time and money -- each child may receive less," said Chen.
The study found that children of single mothers receive less care than those in two-parent families; however, these differences can be explained by other family traits such as poverty and lack of health insurance.
In contrast, children in families with four or more other children make only about four-fifths as many visits to doctor's offices or emergency rooms as otherwise similar single-parent families, while the effect of a large family on a child's prescription-drug use rivaled the effect of being uninsured, according to the study published in Health Services Research.
