Abstract:
Introduction:Everyyear,approximately44millionhouseholds,ormorethan150million
individuals,throughouttheworldfacecatastrophicexpenditure.Ethiopiaisalsooneof
thecountrieswithhighoutofpocketpaymentleadingcatastrophichealthexpenditure.
InOrdertoaddresssuchproblem andcreateequitablefinancingmechanism,the
governmentofEthiopiacurrentlyintroducedsocialhealthinsurancewiththeoverall
objectiveofachievinguniversalhealthcareaccess.Forsuccessfulimplementationof
theschemestudyingwillingnesstopayandfactorsaffectingitiscrucial.
Objective:Theobjectiveofthestudywastoassesswillingnesstopayforsocialhealth
insurance and its associated factors among health professionals in governmental
hospitals,Mekellecity,NorthEthiopia.
Methodology:An institution based cross-sectionalstudy design was used.Study
participantswereselectedusingsystematicrandom sampling.Datawascollectedusing
structuredintervieweradministeredquestionnairesandanalyzedusingSPSSversion
20.Bivariateandmultivariatelogisticregressionmodelsat5% levelofsignificanceand
oddsratiowith95% CIlevelwasusedtoshowassociationbetweenthedependentand
independentvariables.
Results:Twohundredfiftyfive(62.5%)ofwerewillingtoparticipateintheSHIscheme.
Amongthosewhowerewillingtoparticipateinthescheme189(74.1%)werewillingto
pay3 and more percentoftheirmonthlysalary.The median (IQR)ofmaximum
willingnesstopaywere3(1)% ofmonthlysalary.Willingnesstopaywassignificantly
associatedwithmonthlysalary(AOR=9.49,95% CI[2.51,35.86]),awarenessofsocial
healthinsurance(AOR =3.89,95% CI[1.05,14.28]),historyofdifficultycovering
medicalbills (AOR = 6.2,95% CI[2.42,15.87]),attitudes towards socialhealth
insurance(AOR =7.57,95% CI[3.14,18.21])andperceivedqualityofhealthcare
servicesifSHIimplemented(AOR= 2.89,95% CI[1.18,7.07]).
Conclusionandrecommendation:Majorityofstudyparticipants(62.5%)werewillingto
participateintheSHIschemebutstillactivitiesthatenhanceawarenessandpromote
attitudinalchangearerequiredtohavemore
