Annals of Applied Statistics Discussion Paper: Spatial Accessibility of Pediatric Primary Health Care---Measurement and Inference

• Activity Number: 264
• Type: Invited
• Date/Time: Tuesday, August 5, 2014 : 8:30 AM to 10:20 AM
• Sponsor: IMS
• Author(s): Nicoleta Serban*+ and Mallory Nobles and Julie Swann
• Companies: Georgia Institute of Technology and Georgia Institute of Technology and Georgia Institute of Technology

Abstract

Although improving financial access is in the spotlight of the current U.S. health policy agenda, this alone does not address universal and comprehensive healthcare. Affordability is one barrier to healthcare but others such as availability and accessibility, together defined as spatial accessibility, are equally important. In this paper, we develop a measurement and modeling framework that can be used to infer the impact of policy changes on disparities in spatial accessibility within and across different population groups. The underlying model for measuring spatial accessibility is optimization-based and accounts for constraints in the healthcare delivery system. The measurement method is complemented by statistical modeling and inference on the impact of various potential contributing factors to disparities in spatial accessibility. The emphasis of this study is on children's accessibility to primary care pediatricians, piloted for the state of Georgia. We focus on disparities in accessibility between and within two populations: children insured by Medicaid and other children.