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Rural Health
Resources by Topic: Environmental health

Rural-Urban Disparities in Health Outcomes, Clinical Care, Health Behaviors, and Social Determinants of Health and an Action-Oriented, Dynamic Tool for Visualizing Them
Examines county-level disparities in rural and urban health outcomes and presents a health equity dashboard depicting the disparities. Utilizes 2015 and 2019 County Health Rankings datasets to analyze measures such as health outcomes, clinical care, health behaviors, physical environment, and social and economic factors according to urban, suburban, and rural location.
Author(s): William B. Weeks, Ji E. Chang, José A. Pagán, et al.
Citation: PLOS Global Public Health, 3(10)
Date: 10/2023
Type: Document
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"This Is Not My Grandmother's Summer": Rural Populations Are Uniquely Vulnerable to the Health Impacts of Extreme Heat
Discusses the challenges rural areas face in helping address the impact of heat on health. Includes strategies used in rural North Carolina, Indiana, and Washington State to help inform and protect rural residents, including those exposed to heat through work outdoors.
Author(s): Brendan Stermer
Citation: Rural Monitor
Date: 09/2023
Type: Document
Sponsoring organization: Rural Health Information Hub
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Report to Congress on the Outcome Evaluations of Administration for Native Americans Projects
Provides an overview of 2020 Administration for Native Americans (ANA) projects, with a focus on each project's goals, objectives, accomplishments, and relevant data. Summarizes 33 projects that aim to promote social/cultural, environmental, and economic health and sustainability in American Indian/Alaska Native (AI/AN) populations, with several projects addressing population health in rural areas. Discusses the impacts of COVID-19 on ANA projects.
Date: 09/2023
Type: Document
Sponsoring organization: Administration for Children and Families
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The Association of Forced Expiratory Volume in One Second with Occupational Exposures in a Longitudinal Study of Adults in a Rural Community in Iowa
Examines the impact of occupational vapor–gas, dust, and fumes (VGDF) exposures and cigarette smoke on respiratory health. Provides data on 1,071 adults living in rural Iowa according to health status, health behaviors, and lifetime VGDF exposures. Discusses the health implications of work-related VGDF exposures.
Author(s): Paul K. Henneberger, Steven M. Rollins, Michael J. Humann, et al.
Citation: International Archives of Occupational and Environmental Health, 96(6), 919-930
Date: 08/2023
Type: Document
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Assessing Key Indicators of Rural versus Urban Water Quality
Explores the national water quality monitoring data and highlights gaps in information needed to compare water quality across rural and urban areas. Examines water quality data sets and markers while making recommendations for data standardization as well as rural and urban data inclusions.
Author(s): Daniel Kilpatrick, Jeremy Cothran, Stella Self, et al.
Date: 08/2023
Type: Document
Sponsoring organization: Rural and Minority Health Research Center (formerly the South Carolina Rural Health Research Center)
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Socioeconomic and Environmental Determinants of Asthma Prevalence: A Cross-sectional Study at the U.S. County Level Using Geographically Weighted Random Forests
Examines ecological associations of asthma by social and physical determinants at the county level. Includes U.S. maps that depict asthma prevalence as well as determinants such as smoking prevalence, depression prevalence, poverty, insurance rates, and more, which are further analyzed to depict their correlation with asthma.
Author(s): Aynaz Lotfata, Mohammad Moosazadeh, Marco Helbich, Benyamin Hoseini
Citation: International Journal of Health Geographics, 22, 18
Date: 08/2023
Type: Document
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An Active Roadmap: Best Practices in Rural Mobility
Provides a literature review and cases studies related to the ways rural communities encourage health-focused infrastructure, multimodal transportation, economic development, and environmentally safe practices. Describes the typology and demographics of rural areas and discusses how transportation is linked to wellness and community health outcomes.
Date: 07/2023
Type: Document
Sponsoring organizations: Smart Growth America, The National Complete Streets Coalition
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Developing a National-Scale Exposure Index for Combined Environmental Hazards and Social Stressors and Applications to the Environmental Influences on Child Health Outcomes (ECHO) Cohort
Discusses the process of building an index to assess environmental hazards and social stressors on pregnancy. Utilizes factors such as pollution, lack of green space, social economic status, social vulnerability, race/ethnicity, metro versus non-metro location, and more to define exposure risk.
Author(s): Sheena E. Martenies, Mingyu Zhang, Anne E. Corrigan, et al.
Citation: International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, 20(14), 6339
Date: 07/2023
Type: Document
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Telemedicine and the Carbon Footprint of Healthcare: An Empirical Analysis of Illinois Counties
Examines the impact of telemedicine on reducing carbon emissions in Illinois. Provides metro versus nonmetro estimates as well as county-level estimates of carbon emissions savings in both outpatient and hospital settings.
Author(s): Adee Athiyaman
Date: 07/2023
Type: Document
Sponsoring organization: Illinois Institute for Rural Affairs
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How a Black Community Brought Affordable Health Care and Clean Water to Rural South Carolina in the 1970s
Reports on a predominately Black rural community in South Carolina that worked together to provide indoor plumbing, build a health center, and improve health outcomes of their citizens in the 1970s.
Author(s): Olivia Lewis
Date: 06/2023
Type: Document
Sponsoring organization: National Association of Community Health Centers
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