Faculty of Economic and Management Sciences (former Departments)

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Browsing Faculty of Economic and Management Sciences (former Departments) by Subject "Community health services -- South Africa -- Cape Town Metropolitan Area"

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    A descriptive analysis of how primary health care services have developed in the Cape Metropolitan Area from the period: pre-1994 to post-2000 elections
    (Stellenbosch : Stellenbosch University, 2002-12) Zimba, Anthony Andile; Schwella, E.; Stellenbosch University. Faculty of Economic and Management Sciences. Dept. of School of Public Leadership
    ENGLISH ABSTRACT: Primary Health Care (PHC) approach is currently receiving tremendous attention worldwide as a mechanism to ensure effective and efficient public health services. The concept has evolved from the Alma Ata conference (1978). Since then many countries began to reorient their health services to achieve the goals of availability, accessibility and affordability of health care for all citizens and a number of management issues came to the forefront. Therefore, the provision of comprehensive PHC services is the key aspect to improving health services. A district health system has been identified as an ideal model for comprehensive PHC services to all the citizens in South Africa. Public health services in the Cape Metropolitan Area are characterised by functional fragmentation. Two public authorities render Primary Health Care services, namely the: Provincial Administration of the Western Cape through CHSO, and the Municipal Health Department. The fragmented nature of the public health services, which result in poor coordination of service delivery between the two health authorities, compromises the quality of service delivery. Historically, PHC services in the Cape Metropolitan Area - and indeed in the whole South Africa - have developed in a skewed manner. This work is an attempt at conceptualising the implications and consequences of this skewed health development. South Africa is presently undergoing fundamental reform, which has brought the PHC into disarray of fundamental change. Since the South African health care system is a highly complex institution, attempts have been made to critically analyse those aspects and features of inequality, inaccessibility, and inequity. Among these is the historical and present development of Cape Metropolitan Area health care and the structural features it assumed with the passing of time, trends and characteristics. In order to examine the theory in practice, the evolvement of PHC in the Cape Metropolitan Area will be analysed. The analysis highlights how different political formations have affected the development of PHC services and points out obstacles and limitations throughout the process, which had to be dealt with. Transformation of the existing health services, based on the principles of PHC, requires the redressing the imbalances of the past. Therefore, the integration of the two health authorities into one entity would best achieve the principles of district health system and will ensure comprehensive PRe.