Intersection of Migration and Access to Health Care: Experiences and Perceptions of Female Economic Migrants in Canada

Solina Richter, Helen Vallianatos, Jacqueline Green and Chioma Obuekwe
Additional contact information
Solina Richter: Faculty of Nursing, University of Alberta, Edmonton Clinic Health Academy, 11405, 87th Avenue, Edmonton, AB T6G 1C9, Canada
Helen Vallianatos: Department of Anthropology, University of Alberta, 13-15 Tory Building, Edmonton, AB T6G2H4, Canada
Jacqueline Green: Department of Anthropology, University of Alberta, 13-15 Tory Building, Edmonton, AB T6G2H4, Canada
Chioma Obuekwe: Faculty of Nursing, University of Alberta, Edmonton Clinic Health Academy, 11405, 87th Avenue, Edmonton, AB T6G 1C9, Canada

IJERPH, 2020, vol. 17, issue 10, 1-11

Abstract: More people are migrating than ever before. There are an estimated 1 billion migrants globally—of whom, 258 million are international migrants and 763 million are internal migrants. Almost half of these migrants are women, and most are of reproductive age. Female migration has increased. The socioeconomic contexts of women migrants need investigation to better understand how migration intersects with accessing health care. We employed a focused ethnography design. We recruited 29 women from three African countries: Ghana, Nigeria, and South Africa. We used purposive and convenient sampling techniques and collected data using face-to-face interviews. Interviews were audio-recorded and transcribed verbatim. Data were analyzed with the support of ATLAS.ti 8 Windows (ATLAS.ti Scientific Software Development GmbH), a computer-based qualitative software for data management. We interviewed 10 women from both South Africa and Ghana and nine women from Nigeria. Their ages ranged between 24 and 64 years. The four themes that developed included social connectedness to navigate access to care, the influence of place of origin on access to care, experiences of financial accessibility, and historical and cultural orientation to accessing health care. It was clear that theses factors affected economic migrant women’s access to health care after migration. Canada has a universal health care system but multiple research studies have documented that migrants have significant barriers to accessing health care. Most migrants indeed arrive in Canada from a health care system that is very different than their country of origin. Access to health care is one of the most important social determinants of health.

Keywords: access; economic; experiences; female; health care; intersection; migrants (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I I1 I3 Q Q5 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2020
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (5)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/17/10/3682/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/17/10/3682/ (text/html)

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:gam:jijerp:v:17:y:2020:i:10:p:3682-:d:362052

Access Statistics for this article

IJERPH is currently edited by Ms. Jenna Liu

More articles in IJERPH from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().