Abstract
It is estimated that 60 million Americans live in rural areas far removed from urban and suburban health care. Health care and surgical care for rural America is at a crisis. Rural Americans are, in general, older, sicker, poorer, and less educated than their urban and suburban counterparts. Infant mortality and injury-related mortality is greater, there is less insurance and fewer physicians per capita, and it is estimated that there is 20–30% less overall medical service for rural and remote Americans. As the economics of health care evolve, the constraints on rural America become even greater. Many rural hospitals are closing at a time when it is more and more clear that the general surgeon is the economic engine that drives the rural hospital and the rural hospital is quite often the economic engine of the rural community.
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© 2011 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg
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Borgstrom, D.C. (2011). Surgery for Rural America. In: Wichmann, M., Borgstrom, D., Caron, N., Maddern, G. (eds) Rural Surgery. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-540-78680-1_2
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-540-78680-1_2
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Publisher Name: Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg
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Online ISBN: 978-3-540-78680-1
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