Provider Process Quality of Healthcare and its Determinants in Kenya

Abstract

This study seeks to examine the factors that influence provider process quality of healthcare for childhood illnesses in Kenya as indicated by accuracy in illness diagnosis. To do this, the study first employed an ordered logit model on the 2018 Kenya Health Service Delivery Indicators survey data, but then finally opted for the generalized ordered logit model after the Brant test invalidated the proportional odds assumption. The analysis was based on basic microeconomic theory-the principal-agent model. The regression results reveal that health workers with higher level of education, in higher cadres and who had been trained on Integrated Management of Childhood Illnesses were more likely to provide high quality healthcare when presented with childhood illnesses symptoms. Also, being male causes a positive coefficient of the ability to provide quality healthcare. Health facility characteristics, mainly higher facility tier, government ownership and urban location were significant particularly for provision of high-quality healthcare. The results call for implementation of strategies that seek to enhance lower cadre health worker’s child care management, infrastructural development across the country and even distribution of healthcare workers.