Policy review highlights the potential of a National Essential Diagnostics List to expand frontline testing in decentralized primary care, suggesting an avenue to improve diagnostic equity.
The Philippines’ Universal Health Care Act places primary care at its center, yet the barangay health station (BHS), the facility closest to most community members, generally lacks diagnostic capacity. As the Philippines develops a National Essential Diagnostics List, this presents a policy window to introduce rapid diagnostic tests and point-of-care testing at the BHS, enabling same-day diagnosis and expanded access for underserved populations. We argue that NEDL offers a unique opportunity to institutionalize community-tier diagnostics through integrated legal, financing, quality-assurance, and referral reforms, applicable to other decentralized, resource-constrained health systems with similarly under-equipped frontline facilities.
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Kanamori et al. (2026) studied this question.
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