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Accessibility Assessment of Community Care Resources Using Maximum-Equity Optimization of Supply Capacity Allocation

Ming-Hseng Tseng and Hui-Ching Wu
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Ming-Hseng Tseng: Department of Medical Informatics, Chung Shan Medical University, Taichung 40201, Taiwan
Hui-Ching Wu: Department of Medical Sociology and Social Work, Chung Shan Medical University, Taichung 40201, Taiwan

IJERPH, 2021, vol. 18, issue 3, 1-19

Abstract: Equity in accessible healthcare is crucial for measuring health equity in community care policy. The most important objective of such a policy in Taiwan is empowering people and communities by improving health literacy and increasing access to healthcare resources. Using the nearest-neighbor two-step floating catchment area method, this study performed an accessibility assessment for community care resources before and after supply capacity optimization. For the target of maximum equity when allocating community care resources, taking maximum values, mean values and minimum values of the distances into consideration, three analytical allocation solutions for supply capability optimization were derived to further compare disparities in geographical accessibility. Three indicators, namely, the Gini coefficient, median minus mean and mean-squared error, were employed to assess the degree of optimization of geographical accessibility scores at the locations of the demand population and to determine the degree of geographic inequities in the allocation of community care resources. Our study proposed a method in which the minimum value of the distance is adopted as the approximate representation of distances between the service point and the locations of demand to determine the minimum value for supply capacity optimization. The study found that the method can effectively assess inequities in care resource allocation among urban and rural communities.

Keywords: community-based care access; accessibility; maximum equity; optimization; health resources; aging in place; healthcare services (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I I1 I3 Q Q5 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2021
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (4)

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