Spatial Analysis of Health Care Accessibility and Usage in Nebraska
Funding agency: University of Nebraska Collaboration Initiative
This interdisciplinary team comprises experts from UNO, UNMC, UNL and UNK who will collaborate to conduct exploratory research that integrates geography, sociology, anthropology, health informatics and spatial science to understand the role of GIS in understanding mHealth adoption for improved healthcare outcomes. In doing so the team will conduct spatial analysis of health care accessibility and usage in Nebraska. The purpose of this project is to establish a collaborative multidisciplinary team to investigate the potential for adoption of Mobile Health (mHealth) to achieve equitable health outcomes in Nebraska using spatial data analysis. This is exploratory research integrates which sociology, anthropology, geography, health informatics and spatial science to understand the role of mHealth adoption for health equity. The team will gather data on the distribution of healthcare facilities, socio-economic and health status of people in Nebraska and to identify the inequalities in this distribution. They will identify facilities and people in communities/groups which have not had the mHealth interventions with those that have. The results of this research will lead to the development of grants for submission to, National Science Foundation (SCH), National Institutes of Health (NIH) and the Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS). The research conducted by this multi-disciplinary team will lead to a series of research projects that offer solutions that bring about improvements in people’s lives and wellbeing.