Unique Health Care Delivery Considerations in Rural America

Rural regions face significant health care disparities, including decreased access to insurance, increased access barriers to specialty care, worse medical outcomes, and increased mortality rates. People with multiple sclerosis (MS) residing in rural regions in the United States, as well as globally, face similar barriers to accessing MS care and experience poorer disease outcomes. Barriers to health care access include cultural and financial constraints, scarcity of services, a lack of trained physicians, insufficient public transport, and poor availability of broadband internet service. The Appalachian region, which contains a high degree of rurality, experiences increased disparities compared with the rest of the nation and can be used to highlight the unique challenges rural populations face. Appalachian residents can identify as private, and mistrust is a major factor in providing health care. Increasing the quantity and retention of Appalachian providers is essential to building trust. Still, it has proved difficult due to issues with compensation, taxes, malpractice fees, adverse actions against physicians, and high turnover rates. Telehealth interventions such as Project ECHO (Extension for Community Healthcare Outcomes) have improved rural outcomes in multiple diseases, including MS, but limited technology and technological literacy in rural areas impede the implementation of these interventions. Given the increasing rural population and ongoing disparities these communities face, there is a need to develop targeted interventions to improve access and outcomes in rural populations.