Women's Health in Midlife: Factors Influencing Menopausal Symptoms among Rural Women in Tiruvallur District of Tamilnadu

Background Rural health disparities and access gaps may contribute to higher maternal and infant morbidity and mortality. Understanding and addressing access barriers for specialty women’s health services is important in mitigating risks for adverse childbirth events. The objective of this study was to investigate rural-urban differences in health care access for women of reproductive age by examining differences in past-year provider visit rates by provider type, and quantifying the contributing factors to these findings. Methods and findings Using a nationally-representative sample of reproductive age women (n = 37,026) from the Medical Expenditure Panel Survey (2010–2015) linked to the Area Health Resource File, rural-urban differences in past-year office visit rates with health care providers were examined. Blinder-Oaxaca decomposition analysis quantified the portion of disparities explained by individual- and county-level sociodemographic and provider supply characteristics. Overall, there were no rural-urban differences in past-year visits with women’s health providers collectively (65.0% vs 62.4%), however differences were observed by provider type. Rural women had lower past-year obstetrician-gynecologist (OB-GYN) visit rates than urban women (23.3% vs. 26.6%), and higher visit rates with family medicine physicians (24.3% vs. 20.9%) and nurse practitioners/physician assistants (NPs/PAs) (24.6% vs. 16.1%). Lower OB-GYN availability in rural versus urban counties (6.1 vs. 13.7 providers/100,000 population) explained most of the rural disadvantage in OB-GYN visit rates (83.8%), and much of the higher family physician (80.9%) and NP/PA (50.1%) visit rates. Other individual- and county-level characteristics had smaller effects on rural-urban differences. Conclusion Although there were no overall rural-urban differences in past-year visit rates, the lower OB-GYN availability in rural areas appears to affect the types of health care providers seen by women. Whether rural women are receiving adequate specialized women’s health care services, while seeing a different cadre of providers, warrants further investigation and has particular relevance for women experiencing high-risk pregnancies and deliveries.

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Factors Influencing Women's Health-Related Characteristics on Bone Mineral Dysfunction

The Korean Data Analysis Society ◽

10.37727/jkdas.2018.20.1.529 ◽

2018 ◽

Vol 20 (1) ◽

pp. 529-540

Author(s):

Sang-Ju Lee ◽

Eun-Hee Kang

Keyword(s):

Women’S Health ◽

Women's Health ◽

Bone Mineral ◽

Factors Influencing ◽

Health Related

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The South within the North

10.5149/northcarolina/9781469661339.003.0008 ◽

2020 ◽

pp. 195-222

Author(s):

Dan Royles

Keyword(s):

Black Women ◽

African American Women ◽

Women’S Health ◽

Women's Health ◽

Rural Women ◽

Incarcerated Women ◽

Aids Education ◽

Spelman College ◽

The North ◽

Early Experiences

This chapter describes the work of SisterLove, an Atlanta-based organization that takes an avowedly intersectional approach to fighting AIDS among Black women, also turned its attention to AIDS in Africa during the 1990s. Dázon Dixon Diallo, the founder and CEO of SisterLove, got her start in women’s health as a student at Spelman College, where she became involved in the abortion rights movement as well as in the Black women’s health movement. Those early experiences would shape her approach to AIDS education through SisterLove, where she took care to include all kinds of Black women in the group’s outreach, at times focusing specifically on rural women, recently incarcerated women, and women in public housing. Dixon Diallo and SisterLove started from the notion that AIDS programs for African American women needed to address the ways that their lives were shaped by the simultaneous interlocking oppressions of racism and sexism. As the group expanded into South Africa, it also considered the ways that other axes of power, including those of class, region, and nation, shaped Black women’s experiences with AIDS and thus should shape SisterLove’s work as well.

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