Socio-Economic Determinants Of Female Satisfaction With Basic Health Units (Bhus) Of Punjab, Pakistan

Abstract

The study's goal was to investigate female patient satisfaction with socioeconomic variables in rural healthcare services. The methodology of the research was quantitative. The cross-sectional survey method was used to conduct the study. The population of the study was the beneficiaries of BHUs in Punjab. A representative sample size of 160 respondents was selected from 16 BHUs by using a convenient sampling technique from Punjab Province. The structured questionnaire was used as a tool for data collection. The data were analyzed using descriptive statistics. According to the empirical findings from a socioeconomic standpoint, the majority of respondents with low levels of education and income attended BHUs regularly for treatment. The study concluded that BHU services were economically affordable for the majority of the rural population due to their free-of-cost services. On the whole primary healthcare services at the BHU level were satisfactory due to the availability of staff, affordability of services, and accessibility of Services for the community. There was an issue of non-availability of doctors and checking of patients by medical technicians, dispenser, and LHV was not satisfactory. BHUs were lacking in medicines, People were not getting medicine from the BHU due to the non-availability of medicines. Limited numbers of medicines were available at BHU which was not sufficient for people. The situation of medical equipment was also not properly available at the BHUs. The study determined that vaccination was better due to one of the main health facilities at BHUs in Punjab. The study concluded that there is a need to improve the BHU services & facilities for more satisfaction in rural communities.