LeBlanc, M.; McGaughey, T.; Peters, P.A. Characteristics of High-Resource Health System Users in Rural and Remote Regions: A Scoping Review. Int. J. Environ. Res. Public Health2023, 20, 5385.
LeBlanc, M.; McGaughey, T.; Peters, P.A. Characteristics of High-Resource Health System Users in Rural and Remote Regions: A Scoping Review. Int. J. Environ. Res. Public Health 2023, 20, 5385.
LeBlanc, M.; McGaughey, T.; Peters, P.A. Characteristics of High-Resource Health System Users in Rural and Remote Regions: A Scoping Review. Int. J. Environ. Res. Public Health2023, 20, 5385.
LeBlanc, M.; McGaughey, T.; Peters, P.A. Characteristics of High-Resource Health System Users in Rural and Remote Regions: A Scoping Review. Int. J. Environ. Res. Public Health 2023, 20, 5385.
Abstract
A small proportion of health care users are recognised to use a significantly higher proportion of health system resources, largely due to systemic, inequitable access and disproportionate health burdens. These high-resource health system users are routinely characterised as older, with multiple comorbidities, and reduced access to adequate health care. Geographic trends also emerge, with more rural and isolated regions demonstrating higher rates of high-resource use than others. Despite known geographical discrepancies in health care access and outcomes, health policy and research initiatives remain focused on urban population centers. To alleviate mounting health system pressure from high-resource users, their characteristics must be better understood within the context in which it arises. To examine this, a scoping review was conducted to provide an overview of characteristics of high-resource users in rural and remote communities in Canada and Australia. In total, 21 papers were included in the review. Using qualitative thematic coding, primary findings characterised rural high-resource users as those of an older age; with increased comorbid conditions and condition severity; lower socioeconomic status; and elevated risk behaviours.
Keywords
health care; rural health; healthcare inequalities; public health systems research; health care costs; health services research
Subject
Public Health and Healthcare, Public Health and Health Services
Copyright:
This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
