title: Primary care quality between Traditional Tibetan Medicine and Western Medicine Hospitals: a pilot assessment in Tibet.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  This paper assesses both patients' perspectives on the differences in primary care quality between traditional Tibetan medicine (TTM) hospitals and western medicine (WM) hospitals and the efficacy of the government's investment in these two Prefecture-level primary care structures in Tibet.
  
  
  METHODS
  A validated Tibetan version of the Primary Care Assessment Tool (PCAT-T) was used to collect data on 692 patients aged over 18 years old, who reported the sampling site was their regular source of health care. T-tests were performed to compare the separate and total primary care attributes between WM hospitals and TTM hospitals. Multiple linear regression analysis was conducted to examine the association of the health care setting with primary care attributes while controlling for socio-demographic, health service use and health status characteristics.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Compared to WM hospitals, the results showed that TTM hospitals had patients who were older (15.8 % versus 8.4 % over 60 years); with lower education levels (66.0 % versus 35.8 % with below junior high school ) and income levels (46.9 % versus 26.5 % with annual household income below 30,000RMB); more likely to be married (79.2 % versus 60.5 %); made less frequent health care visits; and had higher self-rated health status. Overall, patients assessed the primary care performance in TTM hospitals significantly higher (80.0) than WM hospitals (74.63). There were no differences in health care assessment by patient gender, age, income, education, marital status and occupation.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  TTM patients reported better primary care experiences than patients using WM hospitals, which validated the government's investment in traditional Tibetan medicine.
authors.affiliation: School of Public Health, Wuhan University, 115 Donghu Road, Wuhan, Hubei Province, 430071, People's Republic of China. whwang1986@163.com.|Center for Health Management and Policy, Shandong University, 44 Wenhuaxilu, Jinan, Shandong Province, 250012, People's Republic of China. whwang1986@163.com.
authors.forename: Wenhua
authors.initials: W
authors.lastname: Wang
authors.affiliation: Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, Johns Hopkins Primary Care Policy Center, 624 North Broadway, Baltimore, MD, 21205, USA. lshi@jhsph.edu.
authors.forename: Leiyu
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Shi
authors.affiliation: Center for Health Management and Policy, Shandong University, 44 Wenhuaxilu, Jinan, Shandong Province, 250012, People's Republic of China. yaitian@sdu.edu.cn.
authors.forename: Aitian
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Yin
authors.affiliation: School of Public Health, Wuhan University, 115 Donghu Road, Wuhan, Hubei Province, 430071, People's Republic of China. zfmao@126.com.
authors.forename: Zongfu
authors.initials: Z
authors.lastname: Mao
authors.affiliation: School of Management, Australian School of Business, University of New South Wales, Sydney, NSW, 2052, Australia. e.maitland@unsw.edu.au.
authors.forename: Elizabeth
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Maitland
authors.affiliation: University of Newcastle, Newcastle, NSW, 2308, Australia. stephen.nicholas@newcastle.edu.au.|School of Management, Tianjin Normal University, West Bin Shui Avenue, Tianjin, 300074, People's Republic of China. stephen.nicholas@newcastle.edu.au.|School of International Business, Beijing Foreign Studies University, 19 North Xisanhuan Avenue, Haidian, Beijing, 100089, People's Republic of China. stephen.nicholas@newcastle.edu.au.|Guangdong Research Institute for International Strategies, Guangdong University of Foreign Studies, 2 Baiyun North Avenue, Baiyun, Guangzhou, Guangdong, 510420, People's Republic of China. stephen.nicholas@newcastle.edu.au.
authors.forename: Stephen
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Nicholas
authors.affiliation: China Center for Health Development Studies, Peking University, 38 Xueyuan Road, Haidian District, Beijing, 100191, People's Republic of China. xliu@bjmu.edu.cn.
authors.forename: Xiaoyun
authors.initials: X
authors.lastname: Liu
mesh_terms: D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D016014:Linear Models; D008297:Male; D038861:Medicine, Tibetan Traditional; D008875:Middle Aged; D010865:Pilot Projects; D011320:Primary Health Care / Q000592:standards*; D011787:Quality of Health Care; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires; D018609:Tibet; D019366:Western World