Health service accessibility and deaths from asthma

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Jones, A.P., Bentham, G. and Horwell, C. (1999) Health service accessibility and deaths from asthma. International Journal of Epidemiology, 28 (1). pp. 101-105. ISSN 0300-5771

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Abstract

Background. Good access to health services may be important for effective asthma management amongst patients, thus preventing unnecessary deaths. In a previous study, we found elevated levels of asthma mortality in English local authority districts with poor access to acute hospitals. Here, the relationship between asthma mortality and access to primary and secondary services within the rural region of East Anglia is examined. Methods. A geographically based descriptive study, within 536 electoral wards in the region of East Anglia, England. Regression analysis was used to examine the relationship between health service accessibility, and mortality from asthma during the period January 1985 to December 1995. Results. After controlling for confounding factors, there was a significant tendency for asthma mortality to increase with travel time to hospital, with a relative risk of 1.07 for each 10-minute increase in journey rime (P = 0.04). There was no consistent trend for mortality to increase with travel time to general practitioner surgeries. Conclusions. The results of this study support the conclusions of earlier work that inaccessibility of acute hospital services may increase the risk of asthma mortality. The provision of good access to these facilities may be one factor in reducing the burden of avoidable deaths from asthma.

Item Type:	Article
Faculty \ School:	Faculty of Science > School of Environmental Sciences
UEA Research Groups:	Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences > Research Centres > Business and Local Government Data Research Centre (former - to 2023) Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences > Research Groups > Epidemiology and Public Health Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences > Research Groups > Health Promotion Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences > Research Groups > Public Health and Health Services Research (former - to 2023)
Related URLs:	http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?...
Depositing User:	Pure Connector
Date Deposited:	14 Jan 2015 13:12
Last Modified:	20 Oct 2022 22:31
URI:	https://ueaeprints.uea.ac.uk/id/eprint/51696
DOI:	10.1093/ije/28.1.101

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