Socio-economic factors affecting spatial inequalities in pregnancy-related ambulance attendances in Greater London

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Socio-economic factors affecting spatial inequalities in pregnancy-related ambulance attendances in Greater London

Murphy, Sam; Zhong, Chen; Lopane, Fulvio D; Rogerson, Luke; Gong, Yi; (2024) Socio-economic factors affecting spatial inequalities in pregnancy-related ambulance attendances in Greater London. Frontiers in Disaster and Emergency Medicine , 2 , Article 1402957. 10.3389/femer.2024.1402957. Green open access

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Abstract

Exploring inequalities in ambulance and pre-hospital demand is important to improve service equity and reduce wider health inequalities. Maternity incidents amongst ambulance demand are a key area of focus because of the specialized care that is needed for patients, as well as the impact of wider determinants of health on pregnancy outcomes. Since there are spatial inequalities amongst pregnant patients who call for an ambulance, the aim of this study is to assess the underlying factors associated with pregnancy related ambulance complaints, to determine why maternity patients utilize the ambulance service. Local indicators of spatial autocorrelation were used to identify clusters of ambulance maternity demand within Greater London (UK). A negative binomial regression model was used to explore associations between socioeconomic, environmental, accessibility and demographic variables. Our results reveal that neighborhoods with low adult skills (i.e. qualifications/English language abilities) have a higher rate of demand. Moreover, our results imply that the demand for ambulance services may not be directly tied to health outcomes; rather, it might be more closely associated with patients' reasons for calling an ambulance, irrespective of the actual necessity. The benefits of identifying factors that drive demand in ambulance services are not just linked to improving equity, but also to reducing demand, ultimately relieving pressure on services if alternative options are identified or underlying causes addressed. Doing so can improve health inequalities by firstly, improving ambulance care equity by directly supporting a better allocation of resources within ambulance systems to target patterns in demand.

Type:	Article
Title:	Socio-economic factors affecting spatial inequalities in pregnancy-related ambulance attendances in Greater London
Open access status:	An open access version is available from UCL Discovery
DOI:	10.3389/femer.2024.1402957
Publisher version:	https://doi.org/10.3389/femer.2024.1402957
Language:	English
Additional information:	Copyright © 2024 Murphy, Zhong, Lopane, Rogerson and Gong. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY), https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/. The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) and the copyright owner(s) are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
Keywords:	Ambulance, inequality, maternity, pregnancy, pre-hospital, demand, equity, efficiency
UCL classification:	UCL UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > UCL BEAMS UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > UCL SLASH UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > UCL BEAMS > Faculty of the Built Environment UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > UCL SLASH > Faculty of Arts and Humanities UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > UCL BEAMS > Faculty of the Built Environment > Centre for Advanced Spatial Analysis UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > UCL SLASH > Faculty of Arts and Humanities > Arts and Sciences (BASc)
URI:	https://discovery.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/10204105