Abstract
The number of hospital beds per capita, an important measure of equity in healthcare availability and resource allocation, was found to vary across geographic areas in many countries, including the USA. The hospital service areas (HSAs) have proven to be more meaningful spatial units for studying health-seeking behaviors and health resource allocation and service utilization. However, when evaluating the geographical balance in ratios of hospital beds to population (HBtP), no existing HSA delineation methods directly consider the underlying population distribution. Using Geographic Information Systems (GIS), this study incorporated the State Inpatient Database with census data to develop a population-based HSA delineation method. The census-derived HSAs were produced for Florida and were validated by aggregating and comparing with the traditional flow-based HSAs. The difference in current ratios of HBtP between the most over- and under-served HSAs was approximately 60 times. Significant clusters of high and low ratios were found in Miami and Jacksonville metropolitan areas, respectively. Such results may be of interest to relevant stakeholders and contribute to planning and optimization of hospital resource allocation and healthcare policy-making. Furthermore, the discovery of a strong correlation between the numbers of hospital discharges and the population at ZIP code level holds a remarkable potential for affordable population estimation, especially in non-census years.
Highlights
The number of hospital beds per capita is an important measure of healthcare resource allocation and equity in303 Page 2 of 14 healthcare availability and accessibility (Anderson et al 2005; Jia et al 2015, 2017a; Krueger et al 2009; Mansfield et al 1999)
To mitigate the risk of negative impacts from scarce healthcare resources and optimize the current hospital resource allocation, the hospital beds to population (HBtP) ratios need to be balanced across regions; this will lead to adequate hospital capacity planning and accurate assessment of real-world healthcare utilization (Ashton et al 1999; Fisher et al 1994; Wennberg 1999)
The unassigned 518 ZIP codes were divided into Block group (BG) and assigned to different initial hospital service areas (HSAs)
Summary
The number of hospital beds per capita is an important measure of healthcare resource allocation and equity in303 Page 2 of 14 healthcare availability and accessibility (Anderson et al 2005; Jia et al 2015, 2017a; Krueger et al 2009; Mansfield et al 1999). The number of hospital beds per capita is an important measure of healthcare resource allocation and equity in. Wherever healthcare resources are scarce, patients either incur long waits to be seen in local hospitals or travel to distant ones for care (Jackson et al 2002). Under these circumstances, patients may be prevented from receiving timely care, and the patient–healthcare provider relationships can deteriorate (Hogan 1988; Jones et al 2008; Moist et al 2008; Wilbush 1974). An overarching goal of defining HSAs is to create equitable care across these meaningful units (Jia et al 2015), identifying and eliminating inequalities in hospital resource allocation and other factors associated with distant hospitalization (Jia and Xierali 2015)
Sign-in/Register to view highlights & summary Sign-in/Register to access full text options 
Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have
Schedule a callDisclaimer: All third-party content on this website/platform is and will remain the property of their respective owners and is provided on "as is" basis without any warranties, express or implied. Use of third-party content does not indicate any affiliation, sponsorship with or endorsement by them. Any references to third-party content is to identify the corresponding services and shall be considered fair use under The CopyrightLaw.
