Delivering mental health services to the persistently and seriously mentally ill in frontier areas.
Frontier areas (defined as six or fewer persons per square mile) are at the extreme and of the urban-rural continuum. Whereas they occupy almost half of the land mass of the United States, they constitute only about 2 percent of the population. Exigencies of harsh climate and vast distances make the delivery of health and human services even more difficult than in other rural areas. This paper describes several innovative models for delivering mental health services to the persistently and seriously mentally ill in rural areas.
Department of Sociology, Western Michigan University, Kalamazoo 49008, USA.
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Wagenfeld
D003695:Delivery of Health Care / Q000379:methods; D006297:Health Services Accessibility; D006801:Humans; D008507:Medically Underserved Area; D001523:Mental Disorders / Q000175:diagnosis / Q000628:therapy; D008605:Mental Health Services / Q000600:supply & distribution*; D012040:Regional Health Planning; D019035:Rural Health Services / Q000600:supply & distribution*; D014481:United States