An Assessment of the Provision and Distribution of Health Facilities in Bukuru Town, Plateau State, Nigeria

Abstract

This research investigates issues associated with the provision and distribution of health care facilities in order to promote the well-being of the people of Bukuru town, hence, effectiveness of the health care facilities. Such issues include inadequate provision of health facilities, lack of compliance extant policies and spatial distribution of health facilities. The author looked at the effectiveness of the process of provision with emphasis on broad knowledge as it affects planning and management of health facilities. The list of registered health care facilities was obtained from the Ministry of Health and by identifying and locating their locations. These were achieved with the aid of scientific tools of remote sensing GPS and GIS for an updated map, where the research discovered twenty one (21) health facilities. Questionnaires using the Survey Available Mapping structure (SAM) were used to gather data concerning their categories. The results shows that only one (1) attained the tertiary level, four (4) PHCs while others at health Center level, thus, were uneven distributed (scattered) and insufficient as expected by the policy. The classifications were based on equipment, staff strength and patients’ response to the provision of the health care facilities. The response by the patients shows that all of the health care centers charges certain amount of money indicating that they are profit oriented. There were two (2) government owned and nineteen (19) private health care facilities, bed space ranges from 5 to 40 and covering distance of 5 to 200 km in terms of patronage. Despite the inadequacies of some of the health facilities the patients expresses satisfaction with the services rendered. In order to bring about the desired changes to promote the well being of the people of Bukuru town with estimated population of 168, 275, the research recommended strategies towards attaining the desired goal of effective provision and distribution of health care facilities, such as all health providers to strictly adhere to the policies of the provision, upgrading health facilities to competent health facilities in their true sense and strategy of distribution with the need to improve the additional secondary level of health care in Bukuru Town.