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Rural Health Information Hub

Rural Health
Resources by Topic: Health disparities

COPD Toolkit
Provides information on Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD) and rural disparities related to the disease. Offers links to a guide for hospitals to improve COPD care, webinars, podcasts, and resources from other organizations.
Type: Website
Sponsoring organizations: National Rural Health Resource Center, Technical Assistance and Services Center
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Rural-Urban Disparities in Cancer
Provides data and maps reflecting cancer incidence and mortality, comparing rural, nonmetro urban, and metro counties. Explores urban and rural disparities regarding cancer type, access to healthcare for rural residents, risk factors for cancer incidence, and preventative care.
Type: Document
Sponsoring organization: National Cancer Institute
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Health Equity Toolkit for Rural and Remote Communities
Educational toolkit outlining health equity and steps that rural and remote public health organizations can take to improve health equity. Discusses rural challenges impacting health equity. Offers a curriculum to support staff discussion sessions, procedures for conducting a community health survey, and a session evaluation tool. Email address required to access toolkit documents.
Type: Document
Sponsoring organizations: OMNI Institute, Pitkin County Public Health, Silver Thread Public Health District
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National Indian Health Board Tribal Data Project
Presents a series of maps illustrating American Indian and Alaska Native populations by a number of demographic and health-related measures. Includes maps detailing population, mortality, and veteran status, among others measures.
Type: Map/Mapping System
Sponsoring organization: National Indian Health Board
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Telemedicine for Health Equity Toolkit
Toolkit providing information and guidance for safety-net healthcare systems on telemedicine program development and implementation. Includes sections with information for leadership, providers and teams, and considerations for reaching rural and underserved populations to address health disparities. Toolkit will be regularly updated to reflect regulatory changes and insights from healthcare administrators.
Type: Website
Sponsoring organizations: Center for Care Innovations, Commonwealth Fund, UCSF Center for Vulnerable Populations
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State Approaches for Addressing Rural Social Determinants of Health
Recommends state and federal tactics to improve social determinants of health and address rural health disparities. Covers transportation, broadband, income, and educational attainment.
Type: Document
Sponsoring organization: Association of State and Territorial Health Officials
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Indian Health Service: Sexual Abuse Prevention
Features news, policies, and trainings regarding the prevention of sexual abuse in Indian Health Service (IHS) facilities. Details policies to oversee patient safety in healthcare settings.
Type: Website
Sponsoring organization: Indian Health Service
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Community Resilience Estimates
Offers state and county profiles focused on community resilience, the capacity of community members to deal with and recover from a disaster and its related health, social, and economic impacts. Identifies risk factors for households and individuals, such as poverty level, unemployment, language barriers, and health status, and shares the risk factor results by county within each state and by census tract within each county. Also provides access to a supplemental data set focused on social vulnerability and equity.
Additional links: Community Resilience Estimates Equity Supplement (CRE for Equity)
Type: Website
Sponsoring organization: U.S. Census Bureau
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CDC WONDER Underlying Cause of Death with US-Mexico Border Regions, 1999-2020
Provides access to mortality and population data for the U.S.-Mexico border region. Offers data on the number of deaths, crude and age-adjusted death rates, and demographics for different causes of death. Cause of death data available for ICD-10 codes, drug/alcohol induced causes, causes of infant death, and injury intent and mechanism. In addition to viewing data for the border region, border states, and border counties, results can also focus on the level of urbanization for metropolitan, micropolitan, and noncore areas.
Type: Database
Sponsoring organization: Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
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Delineating Rural Areas in the United States
A poster presentation identifying the common federal rural definitions useful for addressing rural-urban disparities. Demonstrates, by using population characteristics including poverty, uninsured, and disabled data, how each rural definition can affect the sensitivity of the disparity.
Type: Document
Sponsoring organization: North Carolina Rural Health Research Program
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