In this paper, the author intend to analyze the regional structure of medical services in Tsuchiura City (Ibaraki Prefecture), through the behaviors of inhabitants for receiving medical services. Specifically, we will explore those behaviors in terms of the geographical distribution of medical facilities in order to find out its regularity.
1) The distribution of medical facilites corresponds with the densely populated area. Most of the practitioner's clinics are located inside the urban districts, while the large-scale hospitals are situated outside of it.
2) The distribution of medical facilities have expanded in accordance with the urbanization of the city, which forms a concentric zone structure.
3) With respect to the behaviors of the inhabitants for receiving the medical services, regional differences can be found among the three districts: the core area of the city, the suburbs, and the rural area.
4) The four main factors, i. e., distance from the facility, reputation of the medical doctor, medical appliances, and personal connection seem to be responsible for the behavior of inhabitants for chosing the medical facilities.
5) The regional structure of medical services in the city, varies according to the speciality of medical facilities. In case of internal medicine and surgery, the regional structure consists of some regions with a radius of 7 kilometers from a large hospital as the center, in which contains some small service areas of practioner's clinic. As for peadiatrics, medical doctor's reputation has an important effect upon the selection of the facilities, and its regional structure is not clear. In case of obsterics and gynecology, personal connection seems to be an important factor. People's selection of the facilities are rather fixed and unchangeable, but no regularity can be recognized. Therefore its regional structure is not clear. Lastly in case of dentists, personal connection has an important effect on the inhabitants' selection and the range of selection is rather limited. Since many dentists are usually located very close to the residential districts, multilateral regional structure can be recognized.
6) The regional structure of medical services in the suburbs integrates that of several residential areas in the southern districts of Ibaraki prefecture.
