Understanding Geographic and Neighborhood Variations in Overdose Death Rates

The current opioid epidemic continues to challenge us in new and potentially troubling ways. For example, research today finds more overdose deaths occurring in rural, rather than urban, geographic areas. Yet, studies have often ignored heterogeneities within these spaces and the neighborhood variat...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Journal of community health 2019-04, Vol.44 (2), p.272-283
Main Authors: Wagner, Jascha, Neitzke-Spruill, Logan, O’Connell, Daniel, Highberger, James, Martin, Steven S., Walker, Rebecca, Anderson, Tammy L.
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Age Factors
Analgesics, Opioid - poisoning
Classification
Community and Environmental Psychology
Death
Demographics
Drug overdose
Drug Overdose - mortality
Economic analysis
Economics
Epidemics
Epidemics - statistics & numerical data
Ethics
Fatalities
Female
Health Promotion and Disease Prevention
Humans
Male
Medicine
Medicine & Public Health
Mortality
Neighborhoods
Opioid-Related Disorders - mortality
Opioids
ORIGINAL PAPER
Overdose
Prevalence
Residence Characteristics - statistics & numerical data
Rural areas
Rural Population - statistics & numerical data
Socioeconomics
Spatial analysis
Urban Population - statistics & numerical data
Variation
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Summary:The current opioid epidemic continues to challenge us in new and potentially troubling ways. For example, research today finds more overdose deaths occurring in rural, rather than urban, geographic areas. Yet, studies have often ignored heterogeneities within these spaces and the neighborhood variations therein. Using geodemographic classification, we investigate neighborhood differences in overdose death rates by geographical areas to further understand where and among what groups the problem might be most concentrated. For deaths between 2013 and 2016, we find significant variation in rates among neighborhoods, defined by their socio-economic and demographic characteristics. For example, overdose death rates vary up to 13-fold among neighborhoods within geographic areas. Our results overall show that while the rural or urban classification of a geographic area is important in understanding the current overdose problem, a more segmented analysis by neighborhood’s socio-economic and demographic makeup is also necessary.
ISSN:0094-5145
1573-3610
DOI:10.1007/s10900-018-0583-0