Results: Higher levels of networks, civic participation and cohesion were reported in rural areas. Education and income were consistently linked with social capital variables for both rural and urban participants, with those on higher incomes and with higher educational achievement having higher levels of social capital.However, there were also differences between the rural and urban groups in some of the other predictors of social capital variables. Mental health was better among rural participants, but there was no significant difference for physical health.Social capital was associated with good mental health for both urban and rural participants, but with physical health only for urban participants. Higher levels of social capital were significantly associated with better mental health for both urban and rural participants, but with better physical health only for urban participants. Conclusions and implications:The study found that social capital and its relationship to health differed for participants in rural and urban areas, and that there were also differences between the areas in associations with socioeconomic variables.Policies aiming to strengthen social capital in order to promote health need to be designed for specific settings and particular communities within these. Despite this health picture, life in rural areas is often seen as being higher in social capital, as expressed through a greater sense of community and social involvement, than in urban areas.5 But there is relatively little comprehensive research comparing rural and urban areas on measures of social capital, and we do not know whether social capital has similar associations with health in rural areas as those reported in urban studies. This study uses data from a telephone survey to compare the patterns of social capital and their relationship with health for those living in rural and urban South Australia. Social capital and healthSocial capital is a theoretically contested construct with considerable debate on the best ways of conceptualising it (see refs 6 and 7) for a summary of these debates 9 We conceptualise social capital as a means to consider how individuals may differ in their access to particular components of infrastructure (e.g. trust, social networks) which may then differentially provide individuals access to resources such as help and assistance. By considering these individual components in the one analysis it is possible to build up a picture of access to 'social capital', without losing the respective strengths and weaknesses by using an overall measure. We use Bourdieu's approach rather than that proposed by Robert Putnam reflecting the communitarian school of thought. Putnam 10 conceived of social capital as a community-level resource and defined it as "features of social organisation such as networks, norms and social trust that facilitate coordination and cooperation for mutual benefit" (p 67). This view sees social capital as a public good of communities and does not explicitly consider how particular sub-...

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The incidences, types, and reasons behind missed care are a multidimensional construct which can be predicted when known significant factors behind missed care are simultaneously accounted for.

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