Health, Wealth, and Appalachia: Highlighting the Importance of Regional Assessment of Disparities

Document Type

Presentation

Publication Date

10-21-2021

Description

Intro: Rural America experiences disparities in healthcare access, socioeconomic status, health-related behaviors, and chronic conditions, compared to non-rural America. The Appalachian region, specifically the counties within Central Appalachia (CA), are among the poorest and most rural in the country with very poor health, economic, and educational outcomes. Moreover, Appalachia is faces a unique set of challenges even when compared with other rural or disadvantaged regions in the U.S. This study compares such outcomes between the counties of Central Appalachia to the counties of the rest of the United States. Methods: Data from County Health Rankings, American Community Survey, and the Institute of Health Metrics and Evaluation were combined using FIPS codes to create the analytic dataset. Demographic, health outcome/behaviors, socioeconomic, and clinical care characteristics were compared between Central Appalachia (238) and the rest of the U.S. (2,902) using independent samples t-tests.

Results: In 26 different measures, Central Appalachia performed significantly worse (p =.05) when compared to the rest of the U.S. Among the most striking results is the difference between years of potential life lost (YPLL), where Central Appalachian counties have a mean YPLL of 10,657 years and the rest of the United States have a mean YPLL of 8,399 years.

Discussion: This research highlights health disparities faced by rural areas, such as Central Appalachia, compared to the rest of the U.S. Ultimately, these results indicate the need to examine regional differences and variation in population-level characteristics in order to understand and improve the health of these disparate populations.

Location

Denver, CO

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