Consulting psychologists have recognized the importance of providing comprehensive consultation and clinical services for consumers with special needs. Often because of distance and access to consultation services, remote and underserved populations may not have the necessary access to consultant specialists in psychology and other disciplines. Such services are now available through an innovat...

One commonly discussed benefit of broadband access in rural America is the potential for telemedicine visits that allow rural residents to take advantage of urbanized medical services. While the primary benefit of telemedicine is often viewed as improved health care access, the availability of these services also offers significant economic contributions to the local community. Site visits to 2...

From 1980 to 1999, rural designated hospitals closed at a disproportionally high rate. In response to this emergent threat to healthcare access in rural settings, the Balanced Budget Act of 1997 made provisions for the creation of a new rural hospital--the critical access hospital (CAH). The conversion to CAH and the associated cost-based reimbursement scheme significantly slowed the closure ra...

We review 1980s research on American rural hospitals within the context of a decade of increasing restrictiveness in the reimbursement and operating environments. Areas addressed include rural hospital definitions, organizational and financial performance, and strategic management activities. The latter category consists of hospital closure, diversification and vertical integration, swing-bed c...

background and purpose: equity in access to health care has become a desirable policy objective. therefore, accessibility to health care should be provided based on health needs rather than socio- demographic variables. this will lead to a better utilization of health care and improvement of equity in health. the aim of this paper is to examine the effects of family socio-economic status as an ...

BACKGROUND Recruiting medical students from a rural background, together with offering them opportunities for prolonged immersion in rural clinical training environments, both lead to increased participation in the rural workforce after graduation. We have now assessed the extent to which medical students' intentions to practice rurally may also be predicted by either medical school selection c...

BACKGROUND Whooping cough is a communicable disease whose incidence has increased in recent years in some countries with vaccination. Since 1981, in Catalonia (Spain), cases must be reported to the Public Health Department. In 1997, surveillance changed from aggregated counts to individual report and the surveillance system was improved after 2002. Catalan public health is universal with equal ...

BACKGROUND In the U.S. diabetes prevalence estimates for adults ≥ 65 years exceed 20%. Rural communities have higher proportions of older individuals and health disparities associated with rural residency place rural communities at risk for a higher burden from diabetes. This study examined the adequacy of care received by older rural adults for their diabetes to determine if older rural adults...

BACKGROUND There is, globally, an often observed inequality in the health services available in urban and rural areas. One strategy to overcome the inequality is to require urban doctors to spend time in rural hospitals. This approach was adopted by the Beijing Municipality (population of 20.19 million) to improve rural health services, but the approach has never been systematically evaluated. ...

Access to well trained and motivated health workers is the major rural health issue. Without local access, it is unlikely that people in rural and remote communities will be able to achieve the Millennium Development Goals. Studies in many countries have shown that the three factors most strongly associated with entering rural practice are: (i) a rural background; (ii) positive clinical and edu...