Migration and maternal health services utilization in rural Guatemala

David P Lindstrom and Elisa Muñoz-Franco

Social Science & Medicine, 2006, vol. 63, issue 3, 706-721

Abstract: This article examines the relationship between migration and the use of formal maternal health-care services among rural women in Guatemala. We identify assimilation, diffusion, and remittances as three potential pathways through which migration can affect health-care service utilization in rural areas. Using data from the 1995 Guatemalan Survey of Family Health and multi-level regression models, we estimate the impact of migration experience at the individual, household, and community level on the use of formal prenatal care and delivery assistance. We find that urban migration experience and having relatives abroad are associated with a greater likelihood of formal prenatal care utilization, after taking account of background characteristics and enabling resources. Migration experience at all levels is also strongly associated with formal delivery assistance; however, this association operates primarily through the positive association between migration and enabling resources. The differential effects of out-migration on maternal health-care service utilization reflect the different barriers to service use that exist for formal prenatal care and delivery assistance. Financial cost and geographic access are the most important barriers to formal delivery assistance, whereas awareness and acceptance remain as important barriers to the use of formal prenatal care in rural Guatemala. Urban migration experience and social ties to urban and international migrants lower the barriers to formal maternal health-care utilization through the acquisition and diffusion of new ideas and practices, and the return flow of financial resources.

Keywords: Migration; Social; networks; Maternal; health; care; Multi-level; Guatemala (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2006
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (12)

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0277-9536(06)00088-8
Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:socmed:v:63:y:2006:i:3:p:706-721

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.elsevier.com/wps/find/supportfaq.cws_home/regional
http://www.elsevier. ... _01_ooc_1&version=01

Access Statistics for this article

Social Science & Medicine is currently edited by Ichiro (I.) Kawachi and S.V. (S.V.) Subramanian

More articles in Social Science & Medicine from Elsevier
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Catherine Liu ().