Condiciones de Eficiencia de los Consultorios Periféricos de Atención Materno - Infantil

Abstract

The conditions of efficacy in 92 peripheral consulting clinics relying on 16 Chilean Health Services (National Health Service System) have been investigated by the authors. The means utilized are schemes of evalution directed to the attainment of data on: (1) General information about the establishment; (2) Physical capacity; (3) Availabiliy of staff; (4) Availability of materials; (5) Norms and procedures, and (6) Organization and management. Each of those aspects has been assigned a number of points according to its relative importance in the delivery of medical care, within a scale from 1 to 1000 points. This permitted to classify the degree of efficiency of the consulting clinics, as follow:
Very adequate 900 to 1000 points.
Suficient 750 to 899 points.
Less than sufficient 500 to 749 points.
Inadequate 499 and less points.
In accordance with this classification, every consulting depending from the 16 Health Services studied are located in a "Less than sufficient' category for the gyneco-obstetric and pediatric care. This demonstrates that conditions of efficacy of Mother and Child clinics of 8 Regions evaluated scarcely reach a 60% of the necessary conditions required for an adequate medical care. The authors esteem that to raise the efficacy of these clinics, it would be necessary, in a first stage, to orientate actions towards the betterment of aspects tied to the endowment of basic medical equipment and of educational materials. It seems also necessary, at corresponding administrative levels, mechanisms of action destined to formulate and spread out the programs, having into account health equipments involucred in its application, just as the iniciative of programs of supervision and evaluation.