Abstract
Ayudthaya Metropolitan Peoples’ Health Utilization Behavior, Experiences, Health Care Expenditures, and their Attitudes towards ServiceDelivery of Medical Center. People who lived in Ayudthaya Metropolitan were studied to understand their health care utilization behavior and their patterns of health expenditure so as to make comparison with the behaviors of those who lived outside the medical centers’ catchment area. Population factors for sampling in this study were various concentration, socio-economic status, distance to health facilities and whether the people were actually registered at the medical centers. 704 households or 1,794 people were chosen. According to the findings, 61.7% of the sampled population aging 14 or above were insured by any scheme of health insurance. In lower socio-economic area, the public health assistance scheme was mostly possessed. 85.6% of the selected population was insured by single health insurance scheme whereas the remaining was insured by two or more schemes. Self-drug use behavior was common for slight illness while convenient transportation was given for the most reason of those seeking care at the medical center. Private hospitals were largely selected as the first choice due to their specialization. Health care expenditures were various in ranges dependent upon where and what types of services were chosen; however, two-third of total expenditures were spent on private services. Chronic cases were reported highest in number at the medical centers. Most medical center users were satisfied with the providers’ communication and patient-provider relationship. When getting ill, 26.2%, 24.5%, and 19.7% of the population wanted to go to private clinics, the provincial hospital and the medical centers respectively. What the population firstly needed from the services was quick and convenient care. Good communication, price and well-skilled doctors came second, third and fourth respectively. The study suggested that the medical centers more closely work with both public and private facilities to provide increasingly comprehensive care and the multi-center study be taken in order to know overall health care utilization behaviors of the population irrespective of either micro or macro-scale level.
