Technical Support for Health Costs and Access Disparities in Appalachia

UNC-CH Sheps staff will construct a county level database for the Appalachian region using publicly available and proprietary data sources and use these data to develop indices of health care needs and capacity. Methods developed by UNC-CH Sheps for measuring primary care shortages and health costs and access disparities will be combined with other data to characterize counties in terms of health care costs and access variations. The database will be employed by PDA and the ARC to construct indices and maps to analyze, understand, and explain health care cost and access disparities between the US and the ARC region and within the ARC region. UNC-CH Sheps staff will perform some statistical analyses and review data developed by PDA. The data will be used to provide information to ARC policy analysts who are developing priorities and advocating for policy initiatives related to health reform that affect communities and states within the Appalachian region and its subregions. ARC, a state/federal partnership that reports to the White House and 13 State Governors, is particularly concerned about the impact of health reform on state budgets and the impact of federal reimbursement policies on service availability.

Principal Investigator: Thomas Ricketts, Ph.D.

Funding: Appalachian Regional Commission via PDA, Inc.

Total Project Period: 10/1/10-12/31/11

 

Report:

Health Care Costs and Access Disparities in Appalachia (July 2012)

 

Related work in Appalachia by the Sheps Center:

Creating a Culture of Health in Appalachia: Disparities and Bright Spots