Is neighborhood access to health care provision associated with individual-level utilization and satisfaction?

Abstract

OBJECTIVE: To explore whether travel time access to the nearest general practitioner (GP) surgery (which is equivalent to U.S. primary care physician [PCP] office) and pharmacy predicts individual-level health service utilization and satisfaction. DATA SOURCES: GP and pharmacy addresses were obtained from the New Zealand Ministry of Health in 2003 and merged with a geographic boundaries data set. Travel times derived from these data were appended to the 2002/03 New Zealand Health Survey (N=12,529). STUDY DESIGN: Multilevel logistic regression was used to model the relationship between travel time access and five health service outcomes: GP consultation, blood pressure test, cholesterol test,..