Advancing health equity and access using telemedicine: A geospatial assessment
Open accessAbstract
Introduction: Health disparity affects both urban and rural residents, with evidence showing that rural residents have significantly lower health status than urban residents. Health equity is the commitment to reducing disparities in health and in its determinants, including social determinants. Objective: This article evaluates the reach and context of a virtual urgent care (VUC) program on health equity and accessibility with a focus on the rural underserved population. Materials and Methods: We studied a total of 5343 patient activation records and 2195 unique encounters collected from a VUC during the first 4 quarters of operation. Zip codes served as the analysis unit and geospatial analysis and informatics quantified the results. Results: The reach and context were assessed using a mean accumulated score based on 11 health equity and accessibility determinants calculated for each zip code. Results were compared among VUC users, North Carolina (NC), rural NC, and urban NC averages. Conclusions: The study concluded that patients facing inequities from rural areas were enabled better healthcare access by utilizing the VUC. Through geospatial analysis, recommendations are outlined to help improve healthcare access to rural underserved populations.
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They recognized that patients can be burdened by access disparities, particularly the elderly, impaired, disadvantaged, racial minorities, and those where services are limited.
“They recognized that patients can be burdened by access disparities, particularly the elderly, impaired, disadvantaged, and racial minorities, and those where services are limited [15,[34], [35]].”
From REVISITING HEALTH INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY ETHICAL, LEGAL, and SOCIAL ISSUES and EVALUATION: TELEHEALTH/TELEMEDICINE and COVID-19 (2020) · cites this paper as [35]
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- Authors
- Khairat, S., Haithcoat, T., Liu, S., Zaman, T., Edson, B., Gianforcaro, R., & Shyu, C.-R.
- Affiliations
- University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill (US)
- University of Missouri (US)
- Corresponding author
- Khairat, Saif
- ORCID
- Venue
- Journal of the American Medical Informatics Association
- Publisher
- Oxford University Press (OUP)
- Published
- 2019-07-24
- Volume
- 26
- Issue
- 8-9
- Pages
- 796-805
- ISSN
- 1067-5027 (ISSN-L)
- 1527-974X
- PMC
- PMC6696489
- OpenAlex
- W2964306065
- Cited by
- 165
- References
- 54
- Citations by year
- 2026: 11 · 2025: 27 · 2024: 27 · 2023: 27 · 2022: 33 · 2021: 17 · 2020: 22 · 2019: 1
- FWCI
- 16.80
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- bronze
- doi.org
- Licence
- academic.oup.com/journals/pages/open_access/funder_policies/chorus/standard_publication_model (vor)
- Locations
- Journal of the American Medical Informatics Association (publishedVersion)
- PubMed Central (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- Carolina Digital Repository (University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill) (submittedVersion)
- UNC Libraries
- Funders
- National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences
- National Institutes of Health (UL1TR002489)
- National Library of Medicine of the National Institutes of Health (5T32LM012410)
- Topics
- Health Sciences › Medicine › Public Health, Environmental and Occupational Health › Telemedicine and Telehealth Implementation
- Health Sciences › Health Professions › Emergency Medical Services › Global Health Workforce Issues
- Social Sciences › Health › Public Health and Social Inequalities
- Keywords
- telemedicine, health equity, health disparities, rural and underserved populations, health care access, social determinants of health, urban-rural differences, geospatial analysis, North Carolina
- MeSH terms
- Health Equity, Ambulatory Care, Health Services Accessibility, Humans, North Carolina, Telemedicine, Rural Health Services, Vulnerable Populations, Healthcare Disparities, Geography, Medical
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