Clustering and Feature Distribution of Rural Residents' Utilization of Annual Outpatient Service

Abstract：Objective To understand the clustering features of rural residents' annual outpatient service utilization,and to find out the characteristics of outpatients who make highly use of outpatient services.Methods Data concerning residents' outpatient utilization in Macheng from 2012 to 2014 were selected from the New Rural Cooperative Medical System.Excel 2010 was used to sort and merge the data.SPSS20.0 was used to perform a single factor analysis.Results Rural residents' outpatient services utilization was 52.57％.The average use of outpatient service is 3.9 times per rural resident.43％ more or less patients make the use of 81.7％ outpatient services.The Health services utilization Gini coefficients of Macheng from 2012 to 2014 were 0.532,0.533 and 0.527 respectively.Among the individual factors influencing outpatient services,those marks the higher utilization were women(5.3％),the elderly (8.6％),plain terrain (7.1％),highway through the area (7.2％),home address within 10km from the medical institution (5.4％) as well as household size of 1 to 2 persons (6.8％).Conclusion Outpatient service utilization of rural residents characterize high clustering feature.The clustering feature of rural health service utilization is influenced by resi dent population characteristics,geographical traffic conditions,the quality of medical services and other factors.Effective ways to improve the clustering features of utilization of rural clinics service involve improving the residents' awareness of health,the quality and access of care.