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Rural Health
Research Gateway

Research Publications

Browse the full list of research publications from the Rural Health Research Centers.

Products – Freely accessible products include policy briefs, fact sheets, full reports, chartbooks, and interactive data websites.

Journal Articles – Articles in peer-reviewed journals may require a subscription or affiliation with a subscribing library. For these publications, Gateway lists the article citation, a brief summary, a link to additional information and access to the full-text of the article, if available.

Browse Research Products:

Five Most Recent Publications

  • Geographic and Demographic Correlates of Living in Manufactured Homes: Implications for Health
    Policy Brief
    University of Minnesota Rural Health Research Center
    Date: 07/2025
    This brief examines rates of living in manufactured homes by rural and urban location, as well as rates among rural residents by region and socio-demographic characteristics. It also examines differences in crowded housing, housing quality, and housing cost burden by manufactured vs. more permanent housing structures.
  • Access and Quality of Mental Health Services in Rural and Urban America
    Policy Brief
    University of South Carolina Rural Health Research Center
    Date: 07/2025
    Access to and quality of mental health facilities is a significant concern in the United States. This research identified disparities in mental health access and care quality by residence rurality.
  • Preventing Medical Debt Among Rural Residents: Example Programs From Hospitals in Minnesota and Montana
    University of Minnesota Rural Health Research Center
    Date: 06/2025
    This case series highlights efforts by rural hospitals to prevent medical debt for their patients. These may serve as examples to others considering ways to address health care affordability in their rural communities.
  • The Impact of High Hospital Fixed-Cost Ratios on Rural Populations
    Policy Brief
    RUPRI Center for Rural Health Policy Analysis
    Date: 06/2025
    This brief focuses on rural hospitals with high fixed-to-total-cost ratios and describes characteristics of those hospitals, including Critical Access Hospital and Low-Volume Hospital status, and provides some demographics on the communities they serve.
  • Rural and Urban Differences in Suicide in the United States, 2018-2021
    Policy Brief
    ETSU/NORC Rural Health Research Center
    Date: 05/2025
    Suicide remains a significant cause of mortality in the United States. This policy brief examines state-level differences in suicide rates by demographics and geography, with a focus on rural and urban areas from 2018 to 2021. The study employs a cross-sectional, retrospective design using secondary data sources.