[Study on the equity of rural health service in the experimental region of new rural cooperative medical scheme, Yuexi county, Anhui province].
OBJECTIVE
To explore the situation of equity in health service delivery in the experimental region of new rural cooperative medical scheme (NRCMS).


METHODS
A household questionnaire survey was conducted to 2112 residents in the experimental county of NRCMS in Yuexi county with a stratified-cluster sampling on the situation of health service delivery, from July 1-15,2005. Data was analyzed with Epi Info 6.04 and SPSS 11.0 software and indices as rate, ratio, Gini coefficient, concentration index (CI) and chi-square test etc.


RESULTS
There was no significante difference of the treatment-seeking rate during two weeks among five groups economic condition residents (chi2 = 5.52, P > 0.05) and the rates were 48.14 per thousand, 82.90 per thousand, 65.88 per thousand, 48.72 per thousand and 50.66 per thousand respectively with CI = -0.026. Similarly, the hospitalization rates were 59.08 per thousand, 67.36 per thousand, 51.76 per thousand, 58.97 per thousand and 52.86 per thousand respectively in the last year and the CI = - 0.017. But there was a significante difference of rates on chronic disease among the five groups of residents with different economic conditions in the last six months (chi2 = 18.42, P < 0.01) and the rates were 295.40 per thousand, 243.52 per thousand, 230.59 per thousand, 225.64 per thousand and 176.21 per thousand and the CI = -0.055. When income reduced, the prevalence had been increasing among residents. Meanwhile, the collection funds showed unfair in residents with various income and the compensating fund of new rural cooperative medical scheme had not reduced the gap between rich and poor.


CONCLUSIONS
There was an unequity of medicine expenditure and compensating fund in residents with various income in the experimental region. The low income residents had a high health service need and the government should improve NRCMS greatly to change the situation.
Ye
Dong-Qing
DQ
Department of Epidemiology and Statistics, Anhui Medical University, Hefei 230032, China.
He
Yi-Lin
YL
Ma
Li
L
Hu
Ai-Xiang
AX
D002681:China; D003625:Data Collection; D003695:Delivery of Health Care; D005102:Health Expenditures; D006301:Health Services Needs and Demand; D054625:Healthcare Disparities; D006801:Humans; D007182:Income; D019035:Rural Health Services / Q000191:economics / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*