| Abstract |
Health care accessibility is a vital component pertaining to the health of the people. As per the National Health Act of 2015, every person in Namibia is entitled to receive treatment or other medical care. Different factors influence the use of public health facilities in Namibia with accessibility being a primary factor. To comprehend geographic accessibility to public health facilities, data is required on the utilization of public health facilities and to define the public health facility catchments (buffer zones) at a regional level.
The main aim of the study was to identify barriers in accessing public health facilities by the most vulnerable inhabitants of both the Kunene and the Omusati region. This was carried out through applying GIS and other related spatial analysis methods. Secondary data obtained from the equitable project and geospatial data were used. Descriptive statistics were performed to explore the distribution of socio-demographic characteristics of the respondents. Furthermore, chi-square was performed to measure the association between certain variables. SPSS was used for descriptive and chi-square analyses, while arc-map was used for all spatial analysis. All significant conclusions were concluded at 0.05 level of significant. Results showed that 60% of the respondents reported that they always use the public health facility in their area, 11% reported that they occasionally use it whilst 23% do not used the facility in their area but make use of other facilities. A significant difference (2 (4, N = 674) = 266.80, p = 0.000p-value) used between the two regions was observed in this study. Furthermore 82% of households in Kunene region were situated more than 10-kilometer from the public health facilities in comparison to 22% households in the Omusati Region. Overall barriers of access to public health facilities included distance from their home to the clinic (22%), waiting time to be helped (7%) and attitude of the health care providers (4%). The study recommends that the Ministry of Health and Social Services should consider assigning catchment areas for all health centres in the regions. |
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