Transportation for Rural Patients
Rural patients with HIV/AIDS often find themselves with unique problems that make it more difficult to receive important medical services. According to the National Rural Health Association (NRHA), "Distance and small populations pose very real challenges in getting services to people with HIV/AIDS."
An Associated Press article highlights a compromise national funding measure to help bring transportation to these patients:
Patients living with HIV/AIDS in rural parts of the country have frequently found themselves struggling not only with their health problems, but finding ways to travel for medical help that's often located miles away in urban areas.
Advocates said Monday that long-awaited transportation programs in parts of the South can become a reality now under a compromise national funding measure. Along with $70 million in new money, it adjusted the funding formula to help Southern points where the disease is spreading fastest.
"If you look at our urban areas, primary care may be available, but if you go out beyond the reaches of cities like Birmingham or Charlotte, N.C., or Raleigh-Durham, it is not unusual for people living with HIV/AIDS to travel really far distances to get to a primary care provider," said Evelyn Foust, who heads North Carolina's HIV prevention branch.
"They can have a real difficult time getting primary care and that access makes all the difference in the world," she said.
Rural areas have fewer health care providers, and according to the NRHA that "includes providers who are not involved in HIV care and, additionally, providers who are not trained or otherwise prepared to deliver quality HIV services."
