Health care reform must address health care challenges faced by rural women

“I can’t fill my prescription because I have to buy groceries.” One needs only to spend a day in any one of our health care centers to hear stories just like this and to see the need for meaningful health care reform.

by Sarah Stoesz
President
Planned Parenthood Minnesota, North Dakota, South Dakota Action Fund

“I can’t fill my prescription because I have to buy groceries.” One needs only to spend a day in any one of our health care centers to hear stories just like this and to see the need for meaningful health care reform.

Many of the women and families Planned Parenthood serves simply don’t have private insurance. And as a result of the economic downturn, more women who have lost their jobs and their insurance benefits are turning to us for preventative, primary health care.

Nowhere is the need for health care reform more evident than in rural Minnesota. Poverty, lack of insurance and limited access to health care combines to result in poorer outcomes for Minnesota’s rural women, especially when it comes to reproductive health.

Planned Parenthood Minnesota, North Dakota, South Dakota released a new report that highlights the state of rural women’s health and calls attention to the challenges facing women in greater Minnesota. Download the pdf here.

More than half of our 64,000 patients live at or below the federal poverty level. In our 16 Greater Minnesota clinics, the number of patients living in poverty jumps to 63%. Further, nearly 40% of rural Minnesotans live in communities without adequate access to needed primary care services

Geography and economic status should not determine a woman’s health or her fate. And the disparities experienced by rural women in Minnesota are intolerable. Today, we call on lawmakers to focus on the needs of rural women as they return to Washington D.C. to continue their important work on health care reform.

Consider the facts from numerous state based studies (pdf):

For many rural women, access to health care is limited at best, with more than half of Minnesota’s rural counties designated as health professional shortage areas due to an inadequate number of primary care providers.

Fewer rural women receive recommended, preventive gynecological care, including mammograms, breast and cervical cancer screenings and colorectal cancer screening than do their urban peers.

In Minnesota, rural women are 30% more likely to be diagnosed with invasive cervical cancer than are women living in metropolitan areas. Rural Minnesota women are also more likely to be diagnosed at an older age, and at a later stage of the disease, when treatment options may be less successful.

In order for health care reform to address the needs of rural women, it must include access to affordable health care services for all women, including comprehensive reproductive health care, regardless of income. It must include coverage for basic, preventive health care and protections for trusted safety net providers on whom women depend for their care, particularly given the shortage of primary care providers in rural communities.

Health care reform can help level the playing field for women who have been overlooked for too long. Rural women must not be left out of the most important public policy discussion of a generation. And as a leading provider of health care for rural women and families, we are committed to making certain their voices are heard.

Learn more about Rural Women’s health—download the report.

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