Journal of Community Medicine & Health Education
Open Access

Abstract

Disparities in the distribution of healthcare workforce in rural areas has been a persistent problem in the United States for decades. Adding to this problem are complexities of causes surrounding the lack of quality and consistent data regarding rural population health and workforce. Since 2007, the National Center for the Analysis of Healthcare Data (NCAHD) created a data collection process for the generation of national healthcare workforce datasets of physicians, nurse practitioners, physician assistants, dentists and eleven other healthcare providers that is made available through a free internet mapping portal. Much has been documented about current primary care workforce disparities and the need for new incentives and policies to cause more effective change. But to truly understand the impact these disparities have upon rural we must assess them over time and utilize these results for future program planning, program evaluation and policy development. Through the National Center for the Analysis of Healthcare Data Enhanced State Licensure (ESL) dataset, trend analysis of primary care workforce impact has been conducted to demonstrate the impact upon rural over time. Our presentation will provide statistics results of healthcare workforce trends and instruction on how to utilize our free national healthcare workforce internet mapping portal to generate maps, perform spatial analysis in the following manners: View 14 different healthcare providers at the state, county and zip code levels and download the data to your own computer; create service areas based upon drive distance from a userdefined site (e.g. clinic, city, etc.) and perform spatial analysis; view and then download the providers by state, county, zip code; view healthcare primary care provider workforce migration trends analysis and drill down from national to community level data in support of policy and economic decisions. As healthcare providers, educators, grant writers and policy makers have easier access to current healthcare workforce data and other relevant data (demographic, socio-economic, healthcare facilities, healthcare training institutions, etc.), they will be able to make better informed decisions. The participants of this my session will learn about the value data visualization within healthcare management and planning.

Biography

Ann K. Peton is the Director of the National Center for the Analysis of Healthcare Data (NCAHD) located in Blacksburg, Virginia. The mission of NCAHD is to provide data mapping and analysis support of advocacy, healthcare education planning/expansion, research, and other healthcare workforce planning at the national, state and local levels using the nation’s most complete collection of physician and non-physician data, demographic, socio-economic, and political data.
Email:apeton@vcom.vt.edu