An Improved Healthcare Accessibility Measure Considering the Temporal Dimension and Population Demand of Different Ages

Lan Ma, Nianxue Luo, Taili Wan, Chunchun Hu and Mingjun Peng
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Lan Ma: School of Geodesy and Geomatics, Wuhan University, Wuhan 430079, China
Nianxue Luo: School of Geodesy and Geomatics, Wuhan University, Wuhan 430079, China
Taili Wan: School of Geodesy and Geomatics, Wuhan University, Wuhan 430079, China
Chunchun Hu: School of Geodesy and Geomatics, Wuhan University, Wuhan 430079, China
Mingjun Peng: Wuhan Land Resources and Planning Bureau, Wuhan 430014, China

IJERPH, 2018, vol. 15, issue 11, 1-19

Abstract: Healthcare accessibility has become an issue of social equity. An accurate estimation of existing healthcare accessibility is vital to plan and allocate health resources. Healthcare capacity, population demand, and geographic impedance are three essential factors to measure spatial accessibility. Additionally, geographic impedance is usually represented with a function of travel time. In this paper, the three-step floating catchment area (3SFCA) method is improved from the perspectives of the temporal dimension and population demand. Specifically, the travel time from the population location to the service site is precisely calculated by introducing real-time traffic conditions instead of utilizing empirical speed in previous studies. Additionally, with the utilization of real-time traffic, a dynamic result of healthcare accessibility is derived during different time periods. In addition, since the medical needs of the elderly are higher than that of the young, a demand weight index of demand is introduced to adjust the population demand. A case study of healthcare accessibility in Wuhan shows that the proposed method is effective to measure healthcare accessibility during different time periods. The spatial accessibility disparities of communities and crowdedness of hospitals are identified as an important reference for the balance between the supply and demand of medical resources.

Keywords: healthcare accessibility; population demand; geographic impedance; the elderly; urban planning; 3SFCA; real-time traffic; crowdedness (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I I1 I3 Q Q5 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2018
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (4)

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