Exploring Knowledge and Attitude of the Community towards Community-Based Health Insurance Schemes in Gondar City, North West Ethiopia

Abstract

To ensure the community to get access the health care service, many developing countries have designed Community-Based Health Insurance Schemes. However, lack of knowledge and attitudinal barriers made the process of the implementation of these schemes far behind attaining the intended goals and objectives. The objective of this study was to assess knowledge and attitude of the community towards CBHI schemes in Gondar city. Thus, adopting mixed method, a total of 357(male=199 & female=158) government employees working in different sector offices and academic institutions found in Gondar city were made to participate in the study. The quantitative data were collected using survey questionnaire whereas the qualitative data were collected using FGD and semi-structured interview guides. Quantitative data analyses were analysis was made using SPSS version 20. Specifically, frequency, percentage, mean and standard deviation were employed to summarize the data. On the other hand, the qualitative data underwent thematic analysis. Results show that participants have poor knowledge and perception towards community based health insurance schemes. Results also show that participants have poor attitudes towards Community-Based Health Insurance Schemes in the study area. Moreover, the result shows that lack of awareness, lack of knowledge and attitudinal problems as challenges affecting the effectiveness of community based-health Insurance Schemes in the study area. These findings entail implication for social work practice such as Community-Based Health Insurance Agency, Gondar Branch in cooperation with Central Gondar Zone Health Department are recommended to organize workshops and symposium to raise the desired knowledge and attitude towards CBHIS among the community.