Researchers from Michigan and Pennsylvania interviewed 20 primary care physicians in rural Pennsylvania to get their views on the conditions of practice in western Pennsylvania’s rural areas.

This area of the country has the third largest rural population in the U.S.  The researchers uncovered numerous barriers, many of which are interrelated and multidimensional.

Patients are unable to obtain the care they need because of cost-related barriers, including the burden of traveling long distances, insurance practices, and the concentration of specialty care in the largest cities of the state.

The providers made several suggestions in this regard, including

• Establishing mobile and satellite clinics, especially for specialty care such as oncology
• Increasing the use of telehealth
• Allowing advance practice nurses and physician assistants to provide more services

More providers need to be recruited to rural areas to combat the shortage and burnout. Advanced care delivery methods – such as telehealth, satellite clinics, or advanced practice providers – could help bridge the gaps caused by geographic dispersion. Policy efforts should target all these aspects in order to appropriately address rural health care needs.

Providers also pointed out that there is a lot of turnover, and that issues related to burnout have to be addressed. They stressed that the shortage of providers increases burnout and that burnout increases the shortage of providers.

The full text is available on the Rural and Remote Health website (https://www.rrh.org.au/journal/article/7769)

Citation: Maganty A, Byrnes ME, Hamm M, Wasilko R, Sabik LM, Davies BJ, Jacobs BL. Barriers to rural health care from the provider perspective. Rural and Remote Health 2023; 23: 7769. https://doi.org/10.22605/RRH7769