Health care seeking behaviour and its socio-demographic determinants among women in rural area: a community based cross sectional study

Background: The health care delivery system of a country determines the health seeking behaviour of that country’s population. Women’s health care seeking behaviour is undocumented because women suffer the disease in silence, without seeking appropriate remedy for her illness. Hence the study was planned to assess the health care seeking behaviour and factors associated with it among rural women. Methods: This cross-sectional study was conducted in the catchment area of Rural Health Training Centre located in Thane district in January 2024. Sample size of women aged 18 years and above was estimated. Subjects were interviewed after obtaining verbal consent. Data was recorded in pre-designed proforma and was analysed with the help of Microsoft excel. Descriptive and inferential statistics was applied. The statistical level of significance was fixed at p<0.05. Results: Of the 400 women studied, 63.50% were illiterate. 52.75% visit private practitioners for treatment. 56.50% could make own decision regarding their health while 43.50% need permission from senior family members to visit health care facility. Only 42.50% visit to health care facility at the onset of symptoms. Due to time consuming nature, 35.75% were not using government health care facilities. Also, 22.50% women experienced unfriendly behaviour of the health care staff working there. Conclusions: More than half of the women could not seek medical care immediately, two third were not aware of the various government health schemes, emphasizing the need to create awareness about it through grass root level health workers. There is an urgent need to rebuild community trust about public health care facilities.