The worst cities for people with disabilities are often those with expensive, hard-to-access healthcare, according to a new study.
WalletHub ranked the 150 most populated cities in the country based on a number of factors that impact the daily lives of disabled people, including healthcare costs and the number of physicians per capita.
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Of the five cities with the lowest composite rank, just one cracked the top 100 for healthcare rank:
- San Bernardino, California (Full: rank 150; Healthcare rank: 133)
- Greensboro, North Carolina (Full rank: 149; Healthcare rank: 143)
- Providence, Rhode Island (Full rank: 148; Healthcare rank: 132)
- Winston-Salem, North Carolina (Full rank: 147; Healthcare rank: 145)
- Brownsville, Texas (Full rank: 146; Healthcare rank: 80)
The healthcare rankings were determined by nine metrics, including the cost of a doctor visit, the average per-person insurance premium, hospitals per capita and the quality of local hospitals and health systems.
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The city ranked lowest overall in healthcare was New York City, though it had far higher scores for the study's other considerations—economy and quality of life, boosting it to No. 25 in the complete ranking.
The top five cities in the study all had healthcare ranks higher than 20, with the second-ranked city, Grand Rapids, Michigan, ranking first for its healthcare offerings. The top city in the survey, Overland Park, Kansas, placed fifth in healthcare.
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Laredo, Texas, had the lowest costs for visits to the doctor, according to the study, while the cost of a doctor visit was highest in Boston, at a price three times that of Laredo. The cost of home healthcare services was also lowest in Laredo and highest in Fremont, California.
Oklahoma City had the most family medicine or general practitioners per capita, while Corpus Christi, Texas, had the fewest. The number of physicians in Oklahoma City was 30 times that of Corpus Christi, according to the study.