ArticleBMJ open2019
Spatially exploring the intersection of socioeconomic status and Canadian cancer-related medical crowdfunding campaigns.
Article in BMJ open, 2019. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 26 papers, 2 of them syntheses that pooled it.
What it found
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The trial behind it
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Who cites it
26 citing papers in PubMed, 2 syntheses or guidelines pooled it.
- Health inequities in medical crowdfunding: a systematic review.International journal for equity in health · 2025Pooled it
- Success Factors of Medical Crowdfunding Campaigns: Systematic Review.Journal of medical Internet research · 2022Pooled it
- Characteristics of Crowdfunding Campaigns for Proton Therapy.International journal of radiation oncology, biology, physics · 2026Article
- Trust-Building Strategies of Fundraising Consultants in Chinese Medical Crowdfunding Platforms: Qualitative Study.Journal of medical Internet research · 2025Article
- Holistic Influence of Multimodal Medical Crowdfunding Affordances on Charitable Crowdfunding Outcome: Systematic Multimodel Analysis Study.JMIR medical informatics · 2025Article
- Impact of Medical Conditions and Area Deprivation on Fundraising Success in Online Crowdfunding: Cross-Sectional Study.Journal of medical Internet research · 2025Article
- Analysis of Online Crowdfunding Among Patients Pursuing Metabolic and Bariatric Surgery in the United States.Obesity surgery · 2025Article
- Inequity in Washington state covid-19-related crowdfunding.Social sciences & humanities open · 2024Article
- The Use of Medical Crowdfunding to Mitigate the Personal Costs of Serious Chronic Illness: Scoping Review.Journal of medical Internet research · 2023Article
- Racial and gender disparities among highly successful medical crowdfunding campaigns.Social science & medicine (1982) · 2023Article
- The Success of Cancer Crowdfunding Campaigns: Project and Text Analysis.Journal of medical Internet research · 2023Article
- Struggling, helping and adapting: Crowdfunding motivations and outcomes during the early US COVID-19 pandemic.Sociology of health & illness · 2023Article
- Crowdsourcing Medical Costs in Dermatology: Cross-sectional Study Analyzing Dermatologic GoFundMe Campaigns.JMIR dermatology · 2022Article
- Medical Crowdfunding and Disparities in Health Care Access in the United States, 2016‒2020.American journal of public health · 2022Article
- Qualitatively exploring the intersection of health and housing needs in Canadian crowdfunding campaigns.BMC public health · 2022Article
- An overview of Fintech applications to solve the puzzle of health care funding: state-of-the-art in medical crowdfunding.Financial innovation · 2022Article
- Like a Grinding Stone: How Crowdfunding Platforms Create, Perpetuate, and Value Health Inequities.Medical anthropology quarterly · 2021Article
- Crowdfunding as a response to COVID-19: Increasing inequities at a time of crisis.Social science & medicine (1982) · 2021Article
- Exploring Patient-Reported Costs Related to Hepatitis C on the Medical Crowdfunding Page GoFundMe®.PharmacoEconomics - open · 2021Article
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Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
7 authors.
Funding
Abstract
objectivesMedical crowdfunding is a rapidly growing practice where individuals leverage social networks to raise money for health-related needs. This practice has allowed many to access healthcare and avoid medical debt but has also raised a number of ethical concerns. A dominant criticism of this practice is that it is likely to increase inequities in access to healthcare if persons from relatively wealthy backgrounds, media connections, tech-savvy and educational attainments are best positioned to use and succeed with crowdfunding. However, limited data has been published to support this claim. Our objective in this paper is to assess this concern using socioeconomic data and information from crowdfunding campaigns.
settingTo assess this concern, we present an exploratory spatial analysis of a new dataset of crowdfunding campaigns for cancer-related care by Canadian residents.
participantsFour datasets were used: (1) a medical crowdfunding dataset that included cancer-related campaigns posted by Canadians, (2) 2016 Census Profile for aggregate dissemination areas, (3) aggregate dissemination area boundaries and (4) forward sortation area boundaries.
resultsOur exploratory spatial analysis demonstrates that use of crowdfunding for cancer-related needs in Canada corresponds with high income, home ownership and high educational attainment. Campaigns were also commonly located near city centres.
conclusionsThese findings support concerns that those in positions of relative socioeconomic privilege disproportionately use crowdfunding to address health-related needs. This study was not able to determine whether other socioeconomic dimensions such as race, gender, ethnicity, nationality and linguistic fluency are also correlated with use of medical crowdfunding. Thus, we call for further research to explore the relationship between socioeconomic variables and medical crowdfunding campaigning to explore these other socioeconomic variables and campaigns for needs unrelated to cancer.
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Registered trials
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