Understanding variance in health outcomes in England, a study of deprivation and health inequality.

  • Jennifer Murphy

Student thesis: Phd

Abstract

In this thesis, I present a body of quantitative empirical work on the themeof deprivation and health, linking administrative and survey datasets to pub-licly available census data to provide insight into the factors affecting a rangeof health related outcomes. In the first paper, I investigate the impact of dis-tance and deprivation on the uptake of extended hours services in PrimaryCare and conclude that there is evidence of geographical inequity in the ser-vice but that deprivation was not directly associated with rates of use. In thesecond paper, I analyse the trajectory of well-being over the course of the firstwave of the COVID-19 pandemic, and found that wellbeing decreased butbounced back in a similar way across all deciles of deprivation. In the thirdpaper, I analyse the outcomes for hospitalised COVID patients in GreaterManchester during 2020 and conclude that there was a deprivation effect inrisk of death but that the length of stay in hospital for any given patient wasnot associated with their level of deprivation.The work highlights that investigating health outcomes and inequalitiestherein is a complex and difficult task, and at the heart of this must be anunderstanding of what the researcher seeks to measure and how this relatesto the lived experience of the study population.
Date of Award31 Dec 2022
Original languageEnglish
Awarding Institution
  • The University of Manchester
SupervisorMark Elliot (Supervisor), William Whittaker (Supervisor) & Rathi Ravindrarajah (Supervisor)

Keywords

  • wellbeing
  • access
  • primary care
  • deprivation
  • health inequality
  • COVID-19

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