Abstract:
The purpose of the study was to determine health services utilization of the people who lived in the congested communities under the responsibility of Health Service Center 11, Bangkok metropolis. Cross-sectional descriptive survey was conducted and 273 head of family of the selected households or representatives (30 percent of the total households in the seven congested communities) were interviewed by using structural questionaires during October-November 1993. The results of the study showed that 56.4 percent of households had used health services from various health service units. During the past six months period, the users indicated that they used for curative and preventive / health promotive purposes (64.3 and 12.1 percent respectively) and 23.6 percent had used for both purposes. For the mild illness, self medication was used for both children (32.5 percent) and adult (52.4 percent), however for those who had serious illness they went to the public hospital (72.6 and 66.3 percent respectively). Age and education were the only two factors which had statistically significant association with health services utilization. The major reasons for seeking care at the health service center were nearby location, fair convenience, fair availability, good quality and courtesy. Further studies in term of consumers satisfaction and replication of this study should be conducted in the others Bangkok metropolitan area.