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This study focused on the assessment of customer’s satisfaction with the National Health Insurance Fund (NHIF), a case study of selected public and private hospitals at Moshi municipality. These hospitals were Mawenzi, Kibosho and KCMC. The study developed two specific research objectives, namely: examining the availability of health care services under NHIF and the assessment of the quality of health care services provided by NHIF. These objectives were accompanied with two research questions: “How satisfied clients are with the availability of health care services under NHIF?” and ii: “Are the health care services under NHIF quality?”
The study population involved NHIF beneficiaries and service providers in the selected hospitals. Two sample categories were used: interview sample and questionnaire sample. The interview sample involved twelve respondents (health care providers) with four respondents selected from each hospital. The questionnaire sample involved ninety eight respondents (NHIF beneficiaries) randomly selected from sample hospitals’ registers. Therefore the study employed the total number of one hundred and ten respondents. The study used multiple methods of data collection: questionnaire, interview and documentary review. Qualitative data derived from questionnaire responses and official statistics were analyzed by means of descriptive statistics whereby the SPSS version 16 was applied to summarize the data alongside the use of relevant frequency, tables leading to meaningful inferences. Analysis of qualitative data derived from interview, observations and documentations involved.
The research findings show that, the majority of the customers were not satisfied with the NHIF health care services provided to them. They claimed that the provision of health care services was so limited, including: poor supportive facilities, absence of specialized health care services, unsatisfactory number of service providers, poor laboratory services as well as the absence of some prescribed medicines/drugs from the hospital dispensary desk (Pharmacy). But the findings show that, the extent of these limitations varied from one hospital to another. From the study, Mawenzi hospital was
recorded to provide worst health care services compared to the others (Kibosho and KCMC).
The research concludes that, NHIF is considered by her members as nothing but chaos. The conclusion was made via the usage of respondents’ views and opinions. The study involved documentation, themantic analysis and narrative presentation. The themes emerged from the interview and documentary transcripts were documented and their meanings assigned in relation to the research objective and questions. A number of direct quortes which show dissatisfactions have been presented in the analysis chapter. The findings indicate a number of limitations facing NHIF members during their treatment at the hospitals.
The study recommends: hospitals to incorporate government in hiring more staffs so as to solve the problem of shortage of service providers, working environment should be improved, government to ensure drugs and equipments to be available at all hospitals and communications systems should be improved, as it was noted that there is the gap of information between the patients with the agency (NHIF). The functionality of all this will lead towards the satisfactions among the clients. |
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