ArticleThe Journal of rural health : official journal of the American Rural Health Association and the National Rural Health Care Association2026
Rural health care workforce retention measures: A rapid scoping review.
Article in The Journal of rural health : official journal of the American Rural Health Association and the National Rural Health Care Association, 2026. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 1 paper.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
1 citing paper in PubMed.
- Rural health care workforce retention measures: A rapid scoping review.The Journal of rural health : official journal of the American Rural Health Association and the National Rural Health Care Association · 2026Article
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
12 authors.
Funding
Abstract
purposeRural Veterans face persistent barriers to care, often exacerbated by health care workforce shortages. Although recruitment initiatives are important, retaining providers in rural areas is equally critical to sustaining access and continuity of care. This rapid scoping review examined how "rural workforce retention" is defined and measured in the peer-reviewed literature and synthesized recommended reporting elements to improve clarity and comparability.
methodsSix bibliographic databases were searched (2014-2025) for English-language studies of rural health care in the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, and Australia using terms related to rural workforce retention. Data were extracted on definitions of retention, time frames, and measurement approaches.
findingsOf 2392 abstracts screened, 268 met inclusion criteria. Among these, 172 (64%) lacked a retention definition. Of the remaining 96, nearly half (45%) measured retention using providers' intentions to stay or leave; others relied on turnover or continued rural practice. More than half (61%) specified a retention timeframe, most often retrospectively (41/59; 69%). Substantial heterogeneity across definitions, time horizons, and data sources led to the development of a reporting checklist outlining key conceptual, temporal, and methodological elements for retention research.
conclusionsInconsistent and incompletely reported measures of rural workforce retention limit evaluation and scalability of effective strategies. Research should explicitly define retention, specify a measurable time frame, and clearly report key conceptual and methodological elements to enable comparison across settings. For the Veterans Health Administration (VHA) and other rural systems, clear retention metrics are essential to ensure workforce stability and sustain access to high-quality care for rural Veterans.
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What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.