 Planning the optimal level of local maternity service for small rural communities: A systems study in British ColumbiaStefan Grzybowski, Jude Kornelsen and Nadine Schuurman Health Policy, 2009, vol. 92, issue 2-3, 149-157 Abstract: Objectives To develop and apply a population isolation model to define the appropriate level of maternity service for rural communities in British Columbia, Canada.Methods Iterative, mathematical model development supported by extensive multi-methods research in 23 rural and isolated communities in British Columbia, Canada, which were selected for representative variance in population demographics and isolation. Main outcome measure was the Rural Birth Index (RBI) score for 42 communities in rural British Columbia.Results In rural communities with 1Â h catchment populations of under 25,000 the RBI score matched the existing level of service in 33 of 42 (79%) communities. Inappropriate service for the rural population was postulated and supported by qualitative data available on 6 of the remaining 9 communities.Conclusions The RBI is a potentially pragmatic tool in British Columbia to help policy makers define the appropriate level of maternity service for a given rural population. The conceptual structure of the model has broad applicability to health service planning problems in other jurisdictions. Keywords: Rural; health; services; Maternal; health; services; Models (search for similar items in EconPapers) Downloads: (external link) Related works: Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:hepoli:v:92:y:2009:i:2-3:p:149-157 Access Statistics for this article Health Policy is currently edited by Katrien Kesteloot, Mia Defever and Irina Cleemput More articles in Health Policy from Elsevier |
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