Background: Globally, millions of people suffer and die because they do not have the money to pay for health care. A voluntary health insurance scheme is a prepayment mechanism to overcome the financial hardship of poor households. There is a high demand to determine the enrolment rate and ability to pay before scale-up of the scheme by the government to be sure of its feasibility and sustainability. Objective: To determine willingness to join and pay for a community-based health insurance scheme and associated factors among rural households of selected districts in Jimma Zone, 2018. Methods: A community-based cross-sectional study design was employed in selected districts of Jimma Zone, Ethiopia. Multistage simple random sampling was used to select 422 households. Data were collected using a semi-structured interviewer-administered questionnaire. A double bounded contingent valuation method was applied to elicit households' willingness to pay for the scheme. Data were entered into Epi-Data 3.1 and analyzed with SPSS V.23. A binary logistic regression model was fitted to determine the presence of statistically significant associations between the dependent and independent variables at p-value <0.05 and AOR values with 95% CI. Results: Of 422 sampled respondents, 389 participated in this study with a response rate of 92%. Of these, 305 (78%) were willing to join and 274 (90%) of them were willing to pay. The average amount of money the households were willing to pay per household per annum was 228 ETB (8.27 USD), with a range of 100-500 ETB. The older age groups, poor households, and experience of local risk-sharing schemes were found to be determinants for willingness to join the community-based health insurance. Similarly, having a large family size, and low economic and education status of households were significant predictors of willingness to pay for this scheme. Conclusion: A high proportion of households were willing to join and pay for the CBHI scheme. The average amount of money they were willing to pay for the scheme was very slightly lower than what is planned by the government. Thus, the government of Ethiopia should strengthen efforts to scale up this scheme in the rural areas of the country specifically to districts not yet enrolled, to reduce direct out-of-pocket payment at service delivery points. This will also contribute to guaranteeing dwellers of rural areas access to quality health services without facing financial hardship, to achieve universal health coverage for all by the end of 2035.

Background Poor access to institutional delivery services has been known as a significant contributory factor to adverse maternal as well as newborn outcomes. Previous studies measured access in terms of utilization while it has different dimensions (geographic accessibility, availability, affordability, and acceptability) that requires to be measured separately. Therefore, this study was conducted to assess the four dimensions of access and factors associated with each of these dimensions. Methods Community-based cross-sectional study design was used, employing both quantitative and qualitative methods. A simple random sampling technique was used to select 605 mothers who had given birth in the last 6 months preceding the study. Multi-variable binary logistic regression was used to select factors associated with the four dimensions of access by using AOR with 95% CI. Ethical approval was secured from Jimma University Institutional Review Board. Results Five hundred and ninety-three mothers involved in this study, resulting in a response rate of 98%. Four hundred five (68%), 273(46%), 279(47%), and 273(46%) had geographic, perceived availability, affordability, and acceptability access to institutional delivery services, respectively. Antenatal care [AOR = 3.74(1.56, 8.98)], occupation of mother [AOR = 5.10(1.63, 15.88)], and residence [AOR = 1.93(1.13, 3.29)] were independently associated with geographic accessibility. Household graduation [AOR = 1.46(1.03, 2.06)], residence [AOR = 1.74(1.17, 2.59)], and ANC [AOR = 3.80(1.38, 10.50)] were independently associated with perceived availability. Moreover, wealth quintile [AOR = 11.60(6.02, 22.35)], ANC [AOR = 3.48(1.36, 9.61)], and occupation of husband [AOR = 3.63(1.51, 8.74)] were independently associated with affordability. Lastly, mother’s education [AOR = 2.69(1.42, 5.09)], residence [AOR = 2.60(1.66, 4.08)], and household graduation [AOR = 3.12(2.16, 4.50)] were independently associated with acceptability of institutional delivery services. Conclusions Moderate proportions of mothers have geographic accessibility to institutional delivery services, but access to the other three dimensions was low. ANC visits of 4 or above, occupation of husband, urban residence, graduation of mother’s household as a model family, higher wealth quintiles, and maternal educational level significantly affect access to institutional delivery services. Thus, it was recommended that concerned bodies should give due attention to ANC services, female education, training of model families, and enhancement of household wealth through job creation opportunities to increase access to institutional delivery services.

The objective of this systematic review is to identify, appraise and synthesize evidence to establish the effectiveness of community-based health insurance (CBHI) schemes in enhancing the utilization of healthcare services among their members in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs).Specifically, the review objective is to determine if individuals or households enrolled in CBHI schemes in LMICs utilize healthcare services (outpatient visits, hospital admissions, emergency visits, maternal and child healthcare services, or any other services involving the schemes) more frequently than those not included in CBHI schemes.

BackgroundCitizens' Charter is a public promise between citizens and service providing organizations which visibly specifies expectations and standards in the service delivery. Citizens' charter standard has been implemented in Jimma University Medical Center since 2016/17. However, the practice and associated factor of citizens' charter among health professionals have not been studied yet. Hence, the aim of this study was to assess the practice of citizens' charter and associated factors among health professionals.MethodsFacility based cross-sectional study was conducted on 389 health care providers, selected through stratified sampling, from April 1 to April 26. Data was collected using a pretested structured self-administered questionnaire. Data were entered into EPI-data version 3.1 and exported to Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) version 20. Descriptive statistics, binary and multivariable logistic regression analysis were done. P-values less than 0.05 were used to declare significant association between dependent and independent variables. In the process of multivariable logistic regression analysis, knowledge and attitude variables were not tested due to low number of respondents to those specific variables' measuring items. Hence, it was difficult to declare as a predictor at bivariate analysis.ResultFor this study, the response rate was 92%. Out of all, 237(60.9%) professionals were properly practicing citizens' charter standard while 152(39.1%) were not properly practicing it. The factors affecting the practice were job satisfaction [AOR =7.4, 95%CI (4.4, 12.5)], perceived workload [AOR =1.8, 95%CI (1.05, 3.0)] and type of profession [AOR=5.4, 95%CI ((1.98, 14.8)].ConclusionThis study revealed that more than half of the respondents properly practiced citizens' charter. However, few health professionals only knew the existence of citizens' charter. Job satisfaction, perceived workload, and type of profession were the factors affecting the practice of citizens' charter.