Preliminary Investigations of Hospital Geography and Patient Choice in Iowa

This report provides a spatial representation of hospital geography in Iowa and of the decisions of patients to patronize hospitals. It begins with a brief analysis of hospital proximity and hospital proximity’s relationship to population distributions and existing hospital capacity. This is followed with a discussion of hospital capacity as a proxy for the supply of hospital services and the construction of hospital service area gravity models based upon capacity. Patient patronage of hospitals is then presented as a proxy of demand for hospital services, and gravity models are estimated on the basis of patronage.