Assessing spatial accessibility to mental health facilities in an urban environment

Canadian provincial health systems are obligated to ensure access to health services for all citizens, based primarily on the principles of "universality'' and "accessibility'' which is enshrined in the Canada Health Act. Nevertheless, less than 40% of Canadian with mental health problems uses mental health services. Efforts to understand underutilization of mental health services have focused on individual and neighborhood characteristics. The aim of this study was to examine whether we could identify areas with mental health facilities shortage in the southwest of Montreal which may possibly explain disparities in access to mental health facilities. We applied the two-step floating catchment area method for our analyses. The results of our analysis show that mental health services are not equally distributed in the southwest of Montreal and in consequence, accessibility scores vary greatly from one DA to another. (C) 2011 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.