Patient’s backgrounds, perceptions toward a primary medical centers and reasons in getting medical services at general clinic in the provincial hospital

Abstract

Primary health care system takes important role in citizen heath care with abundant of primary care unit near citizen residents in order to solve barrier of distant region health care accessibility problem and appropriate referral system. This research objectives are to study patient characteristics, primary care unit acknowledgement and reason for visiting in general practice outpatient department, result of health care service and traveling details including distance time and money cost of journey to receive health care service. A descriptive cross-sectional study collecting data from 343 patients in sample group with government universal coverage health insurance plan. The result found that 77.84% of the samples are female and 22.16% are male with mean age of 56.01 ± 14.67 year. Majority of samples are freelance general contractor and housekeeper. Average household income was 4,040.06 ± 4,536.75 baht. 54.22% of patients have at least one underlying disease.  95.59% of the patients acknowledge their primary care unit and had experience of using the primary care unit. Average distant to the hospital was 12.22±6.79 kilometers, average time was 30.39±12.23 minutes and average cost was 159.75±69.42 baht. Average distant to primary care units was 3.1±2.63 kilometers, average time was 13.91±6.69 minutes and average cost was 21.86±33.63 bath. 99.41% of the patients were discharge as the result of health care service. The sample group are aware of their own primary care unit but travel to the hospital by choice despite higher cost comparing to cost of traveling to their own primary care unit. The results may be applied to develop strategies for several aspects of primary care unit services and accessibility.