The experience of continuity with the primary care provider with schoolchildren

Abstract

Objective: To know the schoolchildren experience of continuity of care according to their caregivers’ perspective and to analyse its association with the type of Primary Health Care provider (PHC) (doctor or health center) and its funding modality (public versus private, or social security). Methods: A cross-sectional study was carried out in four elementary schools in the city of Cordoba, Argentina, in 2011. Caregivers of children between 9 and 13 years old responded to a self-administered questionnaire that included the Primary Care Assessment Tool (AR-PCAT-CE) to measure the continuity function (affiliation and interpersonal continuity subdomains), the type of PHC providers, and children’s socio-demographic characteristics. Mean scores of affiliation and interpersonal continuity were obtained, and a value ?3 was considered optimal. Results: Eighty-nine percent of the respondents (n=230) were schoolchildren’s mothers. PHC provider was mainly (79.9%) a first level PHC unit, a hospital or a clinic, publicly funded in 60.5% of cases. The mean scores of the degree of affiliation to their PHC provider were 3.30 and 3.27 (p=0.86) when referring to a doctor and center, respectively, and the mean scores for interpersonal continuity were 3.47 and 3.09 (p=0.01), respectively. Among those who identified a health center as PHC provider, the affiliation score was 3.18 for public centers and 3.51 for social security or private centers (p=0.04). Conclusions: Caregivers report stronger affiliation when the PHC provider is private or a social security center; and a better experience of interpersonal continuity when they identify a physician as their provider rather than a health center.