1. In addition to presenting data on the usual supply parameters of health planning (hospital beds, nursing home beds & physicians), POPULIS also directly measures access, focusing on the proportion of residents in a given area who use a service, regardless of where the service is obtained.

Measuring intensity of service use can be used to make comparisons within or among regions: variations in use of different hospitals, relative use of resource-intensive vs. less intensive procedures, and usage patterns of regions with similar health status.

2. The initial focus is on one of the most important factors, socioeconomic determinants of health, and their relation to utilization, supply, and health status indicators.