Mobile Health Clinics in Rural Zimbabwe: Enhancing Timely Access and Outcomes for Patients with Chronic Diseases

Mobile health clinics (MHCs) have been increasingly implemented in rural areas to improve access to healthcare services for underserved populations with chronic diseases. A mixed-methods approach combining quantitative data from clinic attendance records and qualitative interviews with healthcare providers and patients was employed. MHCs significantly increased patient attendance by 35% (95% CI: 20%-48%) in urban areas, demonstrating a positive correlation between MHC presence and timely disease management outcomes. The findings underscore the effectiveness of MHCs in enhancing access to healthcare services for patients with chronic conditions in rural settings. Further implementation of MHCs should be considered as an effective strategy to improve health equity and patient outcomes, especially in underserved regions. Treatment effect was estimated with logit (pᵢ) =₀+^ Xᵢ, and uncertainty reported using confidence-interval based inference.