EC Microbiology

Background: Recently in Ethiopia, there is an increasing movement to implement community-based health insurance theme as an integral part of health care finance. Despite such increasing effort, recent empirical proof shows entering have remained low. The aim of this study is to spot determinants of enrolment in community-based health insurance in Iluababor Zone.

Methods: Data were collected from 384 household heads by employing case control study design with a multi-stage sampling technique. A binary logistic regression was accustomed to determine the determinants of family decisions for health insurance enrolment. The dependent variable was health insurance participation decision among households which is dichotomous in nature. The independent variables were: Age, Sex, Education, Distance to the nearest health centre, Level of awareness, Quality of service delivery, Income and Out of pocket payments. The data analysis was done using STATA version 14.

Results: From the total sample (384), 271 (70.5%) had bought the health insurance and the remaining didn’t. 344 (89.9%) of the respondents were headed by the males and forty (10.4%) were headed by the females. Majority of the respondents were between the age of thirty and fifty (55.2%), attended primary education (51.8%), married (68.2%), farmers (73%), and had family size of < five (54.7%). From 11 proposed independent variables, seven of them were statistically significant at 5% and 10% significance levels and the remaining is not significant. Age has positive relationship with enrolment for health insurance with 0.000, significance level, family size has direct relation with enrolment for insurance with 0.003, significance level, nearness to health centre affect enrolment positively with 0.017, significance level, and awareness about health insurance has the same effect at 0.002, significance level.

Conclusion: Among the major strategies that Ethiopian health sector has on its five-year plan is health insurance. The result of the analysis shows that out of the participants, (70.57%) were members while (29.43%) were not members. Besides, Age, Marital Status, Family size, Chronic illness, Place of treatment, Distance from public health facility, awareness level regarding the program were vital determinant factors that household heads would become members of the scheme.

 Keywords: Determinant; Enrolment; Health Insurance; Households; Ethiopia

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