PROFILES OF HOSPITAL, PHYSICIAN, AND HOME HEALTH-SERVICE USE BY OLDERPERSONS IN RURAL-AREAS

Using data from the Medicare Current Beneficiary Survey, we identify d ifferences in hospital days, home health visits and physician office v isits across five geographical categories. After controlling for indiv idual characteristics and availability of health fare providers, we fi nd significant differences in service use. Results show greater use of home health care and less use of physician office visits and hospital care in rural areas, Because service use exhibits patterns of substit ution and complementarity, future research on the use of health servic es needs to move beyond modeling the use of single services to modelin g the range of services used.