Browsing by Author "Mwesiga, Ishengoma Nelson"

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    Access to quality health care services under community health fund scheme (CHF): a case of Igunga ward in Igunga district, Tabora Tanzania
    (University of Dar es Salaam, 2007) Mwesiga, Ishengoma Nelson
    This study examines the factors that inhibit access to quality health care services under Community Health Fund (CHF) scheme in Igunga Ward. It contends that issues regarding access to quality health care services are too complicated to be reduced either to a single indicator nr be scrutinized in isolation from the context where they exist. This study asserts that the process or rather the decision to access quality health care services under the CHF scheme cannot be divorced from the social, cultural, demographic, spatial, economic and health care delivery contexts of the society under study. Apart from the macro factors, it is within the aforementioned micro characteristics where the issues of access and quality could adequately be addressed and redressed at the local level. In line with the above framework used in conceptualizing access to quality health care under the scheme, this study used both qualitative and quantitative methodology whereby data were generated using in-depth interviews, narratives, focus group discussions and structured questionnaires with both open-ended and closed questions. This study found that the interaction between multiple forms of characteristics, namely; social, economic, cultural, illness, health care delivery, demographic and spatial, not only shaped and guided, but also hindered access to quality health care under the scheme in Igunga ward. The dynamics associated with the question of access under the scheme such as the decision to join or not join the scheme, the attitude of both parties (seeker and provider) in the process, health seeking behaviours of the health care seekers, competing demands on women, the quality of services provided under the scheme among others which are pertinent in understanding and examining the issue of access are enshrined in the preceding contexts.