Jordi Varela, Editor of the blog “Advances in Clinical Management“
The socioeconomic status influences the consumption of goods and services in each community in a very obvious way, a phenomenon which logically includes hospitalisation rates. But in what sense does poverty or wealth determine hospital utilisation? And what role does the accessibility to the number of installed beds in the community play in hospitalisation rates?
To try to answer these two questions I will examine two projects, an English one and an American one that emphasise two different hypothesis, the first one being based on the influence of poverty and the second one, on the installed capacity.