Experiences of Caretakers Seeking Care for Their Under-five Children Related to Public Primary Health Care in Sharg-Alneel Locality, 2015

Abstract

Sudan public sectors’ has three levels of services delivery: primary, secondary and tertiary care. Primary level intended for health facilities that provide the basic package of health services and supposed to be the first contact for seeking medical help, advices and referral to high specialized services. Therefore, coordination between these three levels is important. As well as bypassing primary care level results in overburdening of referral facilities, increasing cost for the patients and depreciating health care system in terms of manpower, equipment and resources. Information about the health services utilizations’ and it’s the associated factors will be useful for improving service delivery to achieve universal health coverage. This paper intended to explore the experiences of caretakers seeking care for their under-five children related in public PHC facilities in Sharg-Alneel Locality, 2015. The study was descriptive cross-sectional applied qualitative research methods. Focus group discussions were conducted with caretakers who had experience with PHC services. Qualitative data was manually analyzed using thematic content analysis. This paper revealed that the main reasons that force the respondents to bypass the primary health facilities and seek care directly from the hospitals were related to the quality of the provided services. Accessibility issues, affordability issues, lack of knowledge of existing services, inadequacy of drugs, health staff competency and proper referrals system which is crucial to a functioning PHC, also reported to be lacking. Also, in this paper the respondents recommend the expansion of health insurance services coverage, provision of ambulances to all PHC facilities. Therefore, this paper recommends to educate and sensitize the individuals, families and community on PHC services role as the first line of health services to increase their knowledge and create awareness of services provided at the PHC facilities. This will increase demand for and improve access to PHC services. Also, to strengthen the implementation and facilitate the monitoring and evaluation by the authorities at the different levels. To enhance role of health insurance fund as purchaser rather than services provider and breach of free health care policy jeopardized affordability of PHC services need urgent actions, and continuous professional development for the PHC healthcare providers which will contribute in improving performance and providing quality PHC, and building their capacity on management of the under-5 common illness and by strengthen the supportive supervision and monitoring.