OpinionsPublic EngagementAging and healthcare satisfaction

Aging and healthcare satisfaction

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Aging is associated with a failing or deteriorating health, which is inevitable, but this should be a less disturbing and more memorable moment in the life of older people.

The experience, which is a transition to a place and time of no return, has to be less painful, both physically and economically, if the older people enjoyed quality healthcare services that are sufficient and affordable.

A study we did in 2019 on the healthcare quality and sufficiency received by the older population in Metro Dumaguete Area, with Dr. Theorose Bustillo and Chereisle Pyponco, explored this issue.

Our data showed that 59 percent of the surveyed older persons aged 60 years old and above got sick a year before the study–a significant figure. Out of this percentage, 31percentwere admitted to the hospitals, wherein 36 percent were males, and 26 percent were females. Fifty-two percent were in private hospitals, and the rest in public hospitals.

We asked them to rate the quality of services rendered by the physicians and nurses in both public and private health-care institutions as well as the barangay health workers whom they had consulted at the time they were sick.

They likewise rated the sufficiency of the healthcare benefits and privileges they are supposed to enjoy according to Republic Act 9994 or the Expanded Senior Citizen Act of 2010.

Generally, the respondents rated “very good” the quality of services rendered by health-care providers and institutions.

This favorable assessment reflects the observed improvement in health care delivery, which may have influenced the improving national life expectancy of Filipinos.

The same was said about the “very sufficient” healthcare services, benefits, and privileges they availed of, although it may not be uniformly enjoyed and appreciated. This contention is based on the highly dispersed ratings given, unlike in the quality of healthcare services.

Nonetheless, the significant positive correlation between perceived healthcare quality and sufficiency ratings reinforces the satisfaction level to the kind of healthcare services they have received from both private and public health-care providers and institutions.

But the differential assessment, even if both ratings are already very high, suggest some spaces where needed interventions may be introduced, so access to healthcare services is more democratized.

So what are the points that the study wants to highlight to make the data relevant or useful to the associations of senior citizens in Metro Dumaguete Area?

First, a much-desired picture of data is needed to warrant the conclusion that all surveyed older persons of various backgrounds shared the same perception about healthcare delivery they had experienced.

Incidentally, the data show significant differences in the ratings of healthcare quality when categorized according to the types and sources of services.

Examples are the parameters of providing the right diagnosis to patients and giving them immediate attention when they go for medical consultation or treatment. The respondents perceived the public health-care institutions to have significantly lagged behind their private counterparts–a popular conception that the latter always offers high-quality services but at a higher price.

Second, although the respondents, on the average, generally rated sufficient the healthcare benefits and privileges they received, there were still items that they perceived to be just enough or insufficient.

The very high sufficiency average ratings on some benefits and privileges, such as the discounted price of professional fees and medicines or some free services to the older people, actually show only part of the entire picture. The actual individual ratings given were between “very insufficient” to “very sufficient.”

And third, how the specific miscellaneous healthcare services, as provided by law, are being implemented and monitored by the national and local government units because of their low ratings have to be seriously examined.

Not only that, very few of the sampled older persons were aware or had availed of the items mentioned earlier, a situation which was likewise true in a national survey, these were also perceived as insufficient, and the individual ratings were extremely diverse.

The miscellaneous healthcare services as a component of benefits and privileges include caregiving from neighborhood support services, medical assistance during disasters, substitute family care, a monthly stipend for medicine, and after hospital discharge follow-up services.

These services need more funds for implementation, and the question that matters now is whether or not the government, either national or local, has enough funds to sufficiently provide all older persons the monthly stipend for their medicines or for after hospital care and follow-up services.

Incidentally, in the course of data validation with government health-care providers, there seemed to be confusion about what agency is responsible for the delivery of the miscellaneous healthcare benefits and privileges–if it’s the local government units, the Department of Social Welfare & Development or the Department of Health.

I believe that as Filipinos live longer, but the economically challenged are likewise significant in number, this demands sufficient budget from the LGUs that are easily accessible to sustain the basic needs and medical services of the older people. This budget is to complement what the national government has allocated.

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Author’s email: [email protected]

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