Health News
- Health Reform Expected To Hurt Recruitment Of Rural Doctors
Recruiting doctors to rural hospitals will get harder in the next few years as the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act reaches full implementation and the demand for healthcare services increases, a new report suggests. An Association...
- Tobacco Use Higher In Rural Areas; Several Factors Include Tobacco Companies' Targeting Of Rural Youth, Lung Assn. Says
Tobacco use is higher among rural communities than in suburban and urban areas, and smokeless tobacco use is twice as common. According to the American Lung Association, rural youth are more likely to use tobacco and to start earlier than urban youth,...
- Care In Rural Hospitals Is Just As Good As That In Urban Hospitals, Study Concludes
While rural Americans have less access to primary care and have worse health outcomes, the care at rural hospitals is equal to, if not better, than that at urban hospitals, a National Rural Health Association report says. The study also found rural health...
- Rural Hospitals To Get Federal Help For Recruiting Physicians
Critical-access hospitals will get help recruiting physicians to their rural areas through an expanded loan repayment program that is part of President Obama's new jobs initiative for rural America. The initiative is called the National Health Service...
- Rural Folks Have More Chronic Conditions And Less Access To Health Care, And Kentucky Is One Of The More Rural States
Though rural Americans have more chronic health conditions than those who live in urban centers, they have poorer access to health care, a working paper released last month confirms. Health experts are pointing to technology, including telemedicine, to...
Health News
Tenn. study suggests rural residents have as much access to care as anyone, if they're insured and don't mind the drive
A health-care study in Tennessee, which started with the premise that people in rural areas have less access to care than urban dwellers, ended with a rather surprising conclusion: They don't. Not if they have health insurance. "When it comes to commercially insured patients, there?s little disparity in access to health care between residents of rural communities and urban areas in Tennessee," said Dr. Steven L. Counter, president of the BlueCross BlueShield of Tennessee Health Institute.
How can this be? The study found that almost half of rural residents pass up the hospitals closest to their homes to go to larger urban hospitals, even if the same services are available locally, writes Getahn Ward of The Tenneseean. "The conclusion we came to is that we?re living in a very mobile society, and the distance is not necessarily a determinant factor in whether people get care or not," said Coulter.
Because the survey did not include consumers, it's only a guess about why they chose to take the time and trouble to go to the big town, but experts says it's a combination of services not being available or a perception that they aren't, even if they are. This raises, again, age-old questions about the viability of rural hospitals, some of which often don?t have the money for capital-intensive technology and services. However, Coulter told the Tennessean that "a recent increase in alliances between rural hospitals and larger hospitals and urban health systems raises hopes that non-urban hospitals may be able to expand their menus of services."
Such partnerships between non-profits and for-profit chains are becoming more common, reports Ward, and some say those efforts will change the perception of those in far-flung regions that great medicine is being practiced close-by. This could be especially important, said Wes Littrell, chief strategy officer and president of Nashville-based Saint Thomas Health, in the new world of health reform. ?We expect that when you get more into population management that you need to take care of the patient closer to home in the lower-cost setting,? he said. (Read more)
How can this be? The study found that almost half of rural residents pass up the hospitals closest to their homes to go to larger urban hospitals, even if the same services are available locally, writes Getahn Ward of The Tenneseean. "The conclusion we came to is that we?re living in a very mobile society, and the distance is not necessarily a determinant factor in whether people get care or not," said Coulter.
Because the survey did not include consumers, it's only a guess about why they chose to take the time and trouble to go to the big town, but experts says it's a combination of services not being available or a perception that they aren't, even if they are. This raises, again, age-old questions about the viability of rural hospitals, some of which often don?t have the money for capital-intensive technology and services. However, Coulter told the Tennessean that "a recent increase in alliances between rural hospitals and larger hospitals and urban health systems raises hopes that non-urban hospitals may be able to expand their menus of services."
Such partnerships between non-profits and for-profit chains are becoming more common, reports Ward, and some say those efforts will change the perception of those in far-flung regions that great medicine is being practiced close-by. This could be especially important, said Wes Littrell, chief strategy officer and president of Nashville-based Saint Thomas Health, in the new world of health reform. ?We expect that when you get more into population management that you need to take care of the patient closer to home in the lower-cost setting,? he said. (Read more)
- Health Reform Expected To Hurt Recruitment Of Rural Doctors
Recruiting doctors to rural hospitals will get harder in the next few years as the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act reaches full implementation and the demand for healthcare services increases, a new report suggests. An Association...
- Tobacco Use Higher In Rural Areas; Several Factors Include Tobacco Companies' Targeting Of Rural Youth, Lung Assn. Says
Tobacco use is higher among rural communities than in suburban and urban areas, and smokeless tobacco use is twice as common. According to the American Lung Association, rural youth are more likely to use tobacco and to start earlier than urban youth,...
- Care In Rural Hospitals Is Just As Good As That In Urban Hospitals, Study Concludes
While rural Americans have less access to primary care and have worse health outcomes, the care at rural hospitals is equal to, if not better, than that at urban hospitals, a National Rural Health Association report says. The study also found rural health...
- Rural Hospitals To Get Federal Help For Recruiting Physicians
Critical-access hospitals will get help recruiting physicians to their rural areas through an expanded loan repayment program that is part of President Obama's new jobs initiative for rural America. The initiative is called the National Health Service...
- Rural Folks Have More Chronic Conditions And Less Access To Health Care, And Kentucky Is One Of The More Rural States
Though rural Americans have more chronic health conditions than those who live in urban centers, they have poorer access to health care, a working paper released last month confirms. Health experts are pointing to technology, including telemedicine, to...