Assessment of performance of public health facility governing committees in Temeke municipality,Dar es Salaam, Tanzania

A cross sectional explorative study was conducted in Temeke Municipality from May to June 2004 to assess the performance of public health facility governing committees. A total of 250 respondents (including 44 facility governing committee members, 106 facility workers and 100 community members) were interviewed using structured questionnaires. The results of this study indicate that there is poor financial resources mobilization for the financing of the facilities by facility governing committee members. It was found that communication between facility governing committees and community members through meetings is also weak. Regarding the supervision of collection, banking and expenditure of cost sharing money the study show that (43.9 %) of facility governing committee members do so while (56.1 %) don’t. Most, (93%) of facility governing committee members were involved in discussing and eventually passing/endorsing plans and budgets of the facility. Major problems identified by facility governing committee members as obstacles to their performance are; first, shortage of human resources, equipment and infrastructure (25.6%) of responses; second, lack of knowledge on the policy of cost sharing by the community ( 22.1%) of responses; third, lack of training/orientation before starting the job (18.6%) of responses. Fourth, lack of mandate/power to make some decisions regarding the facility ( 10.5%) of responses; fifth delay in implementation of facility governing committees request/suggestions by the office of Municipal medical officer of health and Sixth, poor involvement in some of decisions regarding the facility by MMOH for example, constructions of buildings and transfer of facility workers. Lastly, committee members, lack mandate to convene meetings without consultation with village/local government leaderships. In conclusion, the findings from the study show that facility governing committee members need to be trained/ oriented before starting the job and more sensitization to the community to ensure full involvement in health issues and running the facilities is required.