[Perceptions of primary health care among users and health professionals: a comparison of units with and without family health care in Central-West Brazil].
This study analyzes perceptions of performance by primary health care facilities with and without the Family Health Program in municipalities with more than 100,000 inhabitants. Questionnaires from the Primary Care Assessment Tool developed by John Hopkins University and adapted to Brazil, contemplating eight dimensions of primary health care, were applied to users and professionals from a sample of 36 family health care facilities and 28 traditional primary care facilities. Thirty health professionals with university education, 207 with secondary education, 490 adult users, and 133 family members answered the questionnaires. The overall result did not show significant differences between perceptions of family health care facilities as compared to traditional primary health care facilities, but perceptions of health professionals were consistently more favorable than those of users. Comparing the scores for each dimension, family health care facilities always scored better (with the exception of level of access), but the difference in scores between facilities with and without the Family Health Strategy was only statistically significant for all three categories of respondents in relation to the items "family focus" and "community orientation".
van Stralen
Cornelis Johannes
CJ
Faculdade de Medicina, Universidade Federal de Minas Gerais, Belo Horizonte, Brazil. stralen@medicina.ufmg.br
Belisário
Soraya Almeida
SA
van Stralen
Terezinha Berenice de Sousa
TB
Lima
Angela Maria Dayrell de
AM
Massote
Alice Werneck
AW
Oliveira
Cláudia di Lorenzo
Cd
D001938:Brazil; D003191:Comprehensive Health Care / Q000592:standards; D004522:Educational Status; D005192:Family Health; D006282:Health Personnel / Q000523:psychology*; D006297:Health Services Accessibility / Q000592:standards; D006801:Humans; D009111:Local Government; D010361:Patients / Q000523:psychology*; D010465:Perception; D011320:Primary Health Care / Q000592:standards*; D012041:Regional Medical Programs / Q000592:standards*; D013997:Time Factors