Abstract
The objectives of this study are to study a conceptual framework for a theory concerning good governance of health system management in local areas, to create good governance indicators regarding provincial public health office management, which can then be implemented as a tool to evaluate and further develop the organization’s effective governance and also evaluate the level of good governance management of the provincial public health offices in the four pilot provinces: Chiang Mai, Krabi, Cholburi, and Nakhon Pathom. Analysis is done by secondary data, such as annual reports, and related documents, and primary data which were obtained from a questionnaire using three sets: the first set was evaluated by internal officials within the agencies and consisted of 50 indicators, the second set was evaluated by officials with specific functions and contained 11 indicators; and the third set was evaluated by related agencies and consisted of 37 indicators for evaluating good governance management. The evaluation was divided into two parts: the first part was evaluated from the first and the second set of questionnaires by 86 internal officials and the second part was evaluated from the third set of questionnaires by 184 related agency officials. Purposive sampling was used to collect the primary data. Descriptive statistics were used to analyze the data and t-test used to compare the average scores.
The findings based on the evaluations concerning management of the four provincial public health offices, as evaluated by the internal officials, revealed high levels of good governance management. There was an especially remarkable score shown in the Principle of Information Technology and Communication, the Principle of Value for Money, and the Principle of Rule of Law. The evaluation results for good governance management of the provincial public health offices by the agencies related to the provincial public health office of Chiang Mai, Cholburi, and Nakhon Pathom revealed that good governance management was moderate. For the Krabi provincial public health office, good governance management was rated as high. For all four provincial public health offices, the Principle of Transparency was found to have the most significant rating.
In considering the evaluation by the internal officials and related agencies, the results showed that development was still required regarding the Principle of Management, the Principle of Human Resources Development, and the Principle of Participation. Thus, it would be appropriate for each provincial public health office to consider improving its work standards in line with a systematic evaluation of administrators’ work performance. Training programs should be established along with an incentive system for personnel participation and successful official development. Finally, listening to feedback from the outside agencies concerned could help to improve work performance.
