ANNOUNCEMENTS
Introduction: The dominance of private sector can be seen in National Capital of India, Delhi where about 80% of the outpatient services were delivered by the private healthcare sector during 2014-15. The dominance of private healthcare sector has led to increase the out-of-pocket (OOP) healthcare expenditure which makes the healthcare services inaccessible to the poor and middle income class. Hence, it is expected that free primary healthcare services delivered by the mohalla clinics will increase the “access” among the unserved and underserved section of the society.
Objectives: The major objective of the study is to check the effectiveness of mohalla clinics based on the different dimensions of access i.e. availability, accessibility, accommodation, affordability and acceptability. This study also determines the factor associated with the utilisation of mohalla clinics vis-à-vis to public and private healthcare sources.
Methods: Creation of index value based on the satisfaction of the individuals with respect to 5 dimension of access. Multinomial Regression Model and Multiple Regression Model for analysis the factors associated with the utilisation of mohalla clinic and to determine the OOP health expenditure incur in mohalla clinic vis-à-vis to public or private sources respectively.
Results: People do believe that availability and accessibility of primary healthcare services have been improved after the implementation of mohalla clinics. However, there is bifurcation with respect to the area studied as, some of the indicators are not performing well in Mangolpuri area as compared to Peeragarhi area. Furthermore, mohalla clinics are found to be 100% affordable as people have to pay nothing out of their pocket and they were basically utilising mohalla clinic for communicable disease vis-à-vis to non-communicable disease. Also, the poorest and middle income group people are majorly utilising mohalla clinic as compared to richest income group.
Conclusion: The mohalla clinic is effective in delivering the primary healthcare services as we have seen in case of Peeragarhi area. However, they are not performing well in other parts of Delhi as we have seen in case of Mangolpuri area. Hence, Govt. should properly regulate, monitor and implement this policy of free healthcare services so that it functions uniformly across all the regions of Delhi.
