Dissatisfaction with Local Medical Services for Middle-Aged and Elderly in China: What Is Relevant?

Xiaojing Fan, Min Su, Yaxin Zhao and Duolao Wang
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Xiaojing Fan: School of Public Policy and Administration, Xi’an Jiaotong University, Xi’an 710049, China
Min Su: School of Public Administration, Inner Mongolia University, Hohhot 010021, China
Yaxin Zhao: School of Public Health, Xi’an Jiaotong University Health Science Center, Xi’an 710061, China
Duolao Wang: Department of Clinical Sciences, Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine, Liverpool L3 5QA, UK

IJERPH, 2021, vol. 18, issue 8, 1-12

Abstract: As violent clashes between doctors and patients in China intensify, patient dissatisfaction has been identified as a major concern in the current healthcare reform in China. This study aims to investigate the main determinants of dissatisfaction with local medical services attributable to middle-aged and elderly characteristics and identify areas for improvement. A total of 14,263 rural participants and 4898 urban participants were drawn from the China Health and Retirement Longitudinal Study in 2018. Dissatisfaction was measured by two methods: binary outcome (1 = Dissatisfaction; 0 = No) demonstrated the risk of occurring dissatisfaction among various characteristics, and continuous outcome (ranges from score 1 to 5) showed the degree. The mean score of dissatisfaction was 2.73 ± 1.08. Sixteen percent of rural participants and 19% of urban participants reported dissatisfaction with local medical services, respectively. The multilevel analyses demonstrated that participants’ utilization of paid family doctor services decreased the risk of occurring dissatisfaction; dissatisfaction was less focused on females; having chronic diseases increased the risk of dissatisfaction. This study suggests promotion of family doctor services can effectively reduce middle-aged and elderly dissatisfaction with the local medical services. In addition, more attention should be focused on males and middle-aged and elderly with chronic diseases in order to decrease dissatisfaction.

Keywords: dissatisfaction; local medical services; determinants; binary outcome; middle-aged and elderly person (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I I1 I3 Q Q5 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2021
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