A Study on Utilization of Primary Health Care Services among the People Residing in a Semi-Urban Area

Background: Primary healthcare is a vital strategy which remains the backbone of health service delivery. As on March 31^st 2017, there were a total of 25, 650 primary health centres(PHC) functioning in the country. Though the number of PHC’s had increased, the utilization is declining over the years as people seek private health sectors due to various reasons. Objective: To assess the awareness and utilization of primary health care services provided by Thirumazhisai PHC. Methodology: A Community based cross-sectional study was conducted among people residing in Thirumazhisai. The Sample size of 233 was calculated. The study population was selected by simple random sampling technique. A pre-designed, pre-tested semi- structured questionnaire was used to collect data. Data entered in MS excel and analyzed using proportion. Results: Among 233 people, 183 (78.8%) people knew about PHC services. Regarding utilization of services, 165(70.8%) were availing services provided by PHC. The reasons given for non utilization of services were long waiting time (51.4%), dissatisfaction of Doctor-Patient relationship(17.7%), non-availability of essential medicines (14.7%), PHC not clean (8.8%), and PHC does not have all required services (7.4%). Conclusion: In resource-constrained developing countries like India, all efforts should be undertaken to bring about the maximum efficiency of health care delivery. Role of primary healthcare is essential in the progress towards achieving universal health coverage (UHC).