Research Alert: May 31, 2016

State Variations in the Rural Obstetric Workforce

The overall frequency and the increasing rate of obstetric units closures in rural hospitals raises concerns about access to obstetric care among rural women, who experience poorer health outcomes than their urban counterparts. Rural hospitals face obstetric unit staffing challenges due to day-to-day variability in the census of obstetric patients, and as well as challenges with retention, recruitment, training, and scheduling of obstetric clinicians. Many types of staff are necessary to successfully run an obstetrics unit. Across both urban and rural settings, there is regional variation in the types of clinicians attending deliveries.

This policy brief describes the obstetric workforce in rural hospitals by state for nine states: Colorado (CO), Iowa (IA), Kentucky (KY), New York (NY), North Carolina (NC), Oregon (OR), Vermont (VT), Washington (WA), and Wisconsin (WI).

Additional Resources of Interest:

• Obstetric Care Workforce in Critical Access Hospitals (CAHs) and Rural Non-CAHs
• Obstetric Services and Quality Among Critical Access, Rural, and Urban Hospitals in Nine States
• More information about the University of Minnesota Rural Health Research Center
• More information from the Rural Health Information Hub's topic guides: Critical Access Hospitals, Healthcare Access, Healthcare Workforce, Hospitals