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If material is not included in the article's Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. Ensuring access to healthcare is a complex, multi-dimensional health challenge. Since the inception of the coronavirus pandemic, this challenge is more pressing.
Some dimensions of access are difficult to quantify, namely characteristics that influence healthcare services to be both acceptable and appropriate. These dimensions of access are particularly evident in rural health systems where additional structural barriers make accessing healthcare more difficult. Thus, it is important to examine healthcare access barriers in rural-specific areas to understand their origin and implications for resolution.
We used qualitative methods and a convenience sample of healthcare providers who currently practice in the rural US state of Montana.
Our sample included 12 healthcare providers from diverse training backgrounds and specialties. Semi-structured interviews and content analysis were used to explore barriers—appropriateness and acceptability—to healthcare access in their patient populations.
