The prevalence and determinants of unmet healthcare needs in Bulgaria.
Journal
PloS one
ISSN: 1932-6203
Titre abrégé: PLoS One
Pays: United States
ID NLM: 101285081
Informations de publication
Date de publication:
2024
2024
Historique:
received:
01
08
2024
accepted:
08
10
2024
medline:
29
10
2024
pubmed:
29
10
2024
entrez:
29
10
2024
Statut:
epublish
Résumé
Self-reported unmet healthcare needs are a useful indicator of access to healthcare, but there is little research from low- and middle-income countries. This study sought to investigate the prevalence and determinants of unmet needs arising from wait times, distance/transportation and financial affordability in Bulgaria using European Health Interview Survey data. We explored associations between individual characteristics and the probability of reporting unmet need by fitting logistic regression models to the data. Unaffordability-related unmet needs were the most cited barrier to access. The largest proportion of people reported unmet dental care needs (14%) or unmet needs due to unaffordability of medicines (8%); distance/transportation problems were the least cited reason (3%). People with poor physical and mental health had a substantially higher probability of experiencing unmet needs. Those with a disability, less disposable income, less social support and lower educational attainment were also more likely to report unmet healthcare needs. People who lived in rural areas experienced specific barriers to access, most notably from distance or transportation issues. Unmet healthcare needs lead to inefficiencies for the healthcare system and are more prevalent among already disadvantaged societal groups. Ensuring better access to healthcare is therefore important from both the efficiency and equity perspectives.
Identifiants
pubmed: 39471180
doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0312475
pii: PONE-D-24-32036
pmc: PMC11521248
doi:
Types de publication
Journal Article
Langues
eng
Sous-ensembles de citation
IM
Pagination
e0312475Informations de copyright
Copyright: © 2024 Maslyankov, Hernández. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.
Déclaration de conflit d'intérêts
The authors have declared that no competing interests exist.
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