Regional and remote occupational therapy: A preliminary exploration of private occupational therapy practice.

CONCLUSIONS: There is a potential market failure of private occupational therapy in rural and remote areas, impacting on people who need these services and on workforce replacement. Contributing factors include population imbalance between cities and regional/remote areas, financial implications where only face-to-face contact is paid for and low incomes and levels of health insurance in regional/remote areas. Potential strategies include addressing the lack of reimbursement for travel, enabling private providers to overcome barriers to providing student placements and recognising rural practice as a specialist field. PMID: 23888978 [PubMed - in process]
Source: Rural Remote Health - Category: Rural Health Authors: Tags: Aust Occup Ther J Source Type: research