Disparities in Patterns of Health Care Travel Among Inpatients Diagnosed With Congestive Heart Failure, Florida, 2011

Abstract

IntroductionCongestive heart failure (CHF) is a major public health problem in the United States and is a leading cause of hospitalization in the elderly population. Understanding the health care travel patterns of CHF patients and their underlying cause is important to balance the supply and demand for local hospital resources. This article explores the nonclinical factors that prompt CHF patients to seek distant instead of local hospitalization.MethodsLocal hospitalization was defined as inpatients staying within hospital service areas, and distant hospitalization was defined as inpatients traveling outside hospital service areas, based on individual hospital discharge data in 2011 generated by a Dartmouth–Swiss hybrid approach. Multiple logistic and linear regression models were used to compare the travel patterns of different groups of inpatients in Florida.ResultsBlack patients, no-charge patients, patients living in large metropolitan areas, and patients with a low socioeconomic status were more likely to seek local hospitalization than were white patients, those who were privately insured, those who lived in rural areas, and those with a high socioeconomic status, respectively.ConclusionFindings indicate that different populations diagnosed with CHF had different travel patterns for hospitalization. Changes or disruptions in local hospital supply could differentially affect different groups in a population. Policy makers could target efforts to CHF patients who are less likely to travel to seek treatment.

Differential effects of distance decay on hospital inpatient visits among subpopulations in Florida, USA

“…The comparison among racial/ethnic subgroups reveals that mobility for seeking hospital services is more limited for blacks and Hispanics than for whites and Asians. Compared with a previous study focusing on the healthcare travel patterns of only congestive heart failure patients (Jia and Xierali 2015), this study found a similar pattern among racial/ethnic groups. The longest average travel time by Native Americans should be interpreted with caution due to a smaller sample size of this group.…”

Applications of geographic information systems (GIS) data and methods in obesity‐related research

“…Geographic information system‐based network analysis refers to all spatial analyses conducted on the basis of a real‐road network. It offers a way to identify the shortest or any path between addresses (or between centroids for areas ) and estimate the travel distance, or expected travel time, if the speed limit or other traffic information is provided. More than one‐third (48 of 121, 39.7%) of the reviewed studies used network analysis (Appendix S1).…”

Socio-Spatial Entanglement Theory, the I2S2A Method, and Civil Legal Service Realized Accessibility

“…The first research strand challenges this assumption by demonstrating that the simultaneous examination of spatial and social service accessibility factors describes service accessibility better than combining spatial and social service accessibility research studies. (Jia & Xierali, 2015;Schultheis, 2014;Wang & Luo, 2005).…”

“…Existing research describes how the user/type cross-section fails to capture the factors that mediate service accessibility (Hawthorne & Kwan, 2012;Jia & Xierali, 2015;Schultheis, 2014;Wang & Luo, 2005). This research attempts to explicitly invalidates the user/type cross-section and connect service accessibility research with the reality of service usage.…”