Availability of General Practice Doctors to Low-Income Areas

Angel Chang

Objective: My project strives to look into the correlation between the poverty rates in Prince George's County and the number of doctors in those areas. The costs of healthcare rise continually, but everyone, especially families with children, requires the services of general and family practitioners. But are these doctors available to low-income families and individuals? What does this mean for Prince George's County residents who are low-income but still need the care that general and family practitioners offer?

Number of Doctors' Offices in Prince George's County: 66. 

This number only takes into account those doctors' offices that are listed with MapQuest because those are the doctors that would be more likely to accept walk-ins. Also, this is the number of doctors' offices. Doctors often open offices in groups, so one point on the map would likely represent more than one doctor.

The Spread of Doctors Over Prince George's County

Conclusion 1: There are few to no general practitioners or family practices in the southwestern region of Prince George's County. Clearly, citizens in that region must travel to neighboring counties or travel longer distances to see doctors.

The Poverty Rate of Families in Prince George's County

Source of the poverty map: Census Tract

The blue outline is the county border and the blue dots represent the doctors' offices in Prince George's County. The family poverty rate is measured in per cent. Some of the points are thicker than others because many of the doctors' offices are located very close to each other, and high resolution on a map of this size is difficult to achieve.

Conclusion 2: Many of the doctors' offices in Prince George's County are located along the western border and in the western of the county. These are also the areas with higher poverty rates than the other parts of the county. However, there are no doctors' offices located right in the areas of the highest family poverty rates.

The Poverty Rate of Individuals in Prince George's County

Source of the poverty map: Census Tract

The red line represents the Prince George's County border, and the red dots represent the doctors' offices. Again, the poverty rate is measured in per cent.

Conclusion 3: From looking at the poverty rates of individuals in Prince George's County, it is clear that while doctors' offices are accessible, none of the clusters of doctors' offices are in the darkest shaded regions.

So what does this all mean?

Doctors clearly do not make themselves scarce to low-income individuals and families. However, none of the offices are located in the regions of highest poverty rates in both the family and individual maps. Physical accessibility should not be a major problem for most low-income residents of Prince George's County.

Some questions remain, though: Do these doctors accept the insurance that low-income residents would be able to afford? Do they accept Medicaid? Are the rates for their services lower? If not, where do those residents go for healthcare, or do they simply forego it? These are questions that remain to be answered and would offer yet another look into the dynamics between the doctors and residents of Prince George's County.