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Centre for Policy on Ageing | |
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| Health seeking behaviour of older persons in Zimbabwe | | Author(s) | A C Nyanguru |
| Journal title | BOLD, vol 18, no 2, February 2008 |
| Publisher | International Institute on Ageing (United Nations - Malta), February 2008 |
| Pages | pp 11-26 |
| Source | http://www.inia.org.mt |
| Keywords | Health services ; Usage [services] ; Urban areas ; Rural areas ; Social surveys ; Zimbabwe. |
| Annotation | The poverty of older people in Africa translates into poor nutrition and health and sustaining burden brought about by the HIV/AIDS epidemic. This further aggravates the search for income generation opportunities. Their situation also affects health-seeking behaviour to attain well-being. All people have concepts about health and illness which are part of their culture. Every society also has beliefs about how to stay healthy, how to prevent illness, and how to treat people who are sick; yet no known study has been carried out regarding older people's health-seeking behaviour in Zimbabwe. This paper is based on a study of older people aged 60+ living in Harare, Mutare and villages up to 50 km from these cities, in which their choice of a health care provider and their reasons for doing so were studied. Results showed that slightly more than one tenth of respondents used self-treatment, a third visited a clinic, another third a hospital, a fifth a private doctor. Traditional healers (or angas) or religious practitioners were each used by less than 5% of respondents. There were significant differences in the use of health care providers between older people living in rural areas and those in urban areas. Three-quarters of the respondents reported on the quick, good and efficient service they received from the use of their chosen health care provider, while the rest mentioned accessibility, affordability, availability, trust in and reliability of the health care provider as the reasons for their choice. (RH). |
| Accession Number | CPA-080327223 A |
| Classmark | L: QLD: RK: RL: 3F: 7NR |
Data © Centre for Policy on Ageing |
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| ...from the Ageinfo database published by Centre for Policy on Ageing. |
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