Public-Private Partnership in Health Care and its Impact on Health Outcomes: Evidence from Ruharo Mission Hospital in South Western Uganda

Abstract

Background: Uganda’s government embraced private provision of social services including health care. The involvement of private providers is an indicator that the public facilities are not sufficient enough to meet the high demands of the ever-increasing population. This has been done through partnership arrangements. This paper discusses the impact of Public-Private Partnership (PPP) on health care outcomes of the local population and opportunities for improving health outcomes, challenges facing private providers in a low-income setting like Uganda. Methodology: This was a qualitative study, data were collected using qualitative methods in January 2017 through interview (using semi-structured questions) at Ruharo Mission Hospital (RMH) administration, health workers, district health office and used a structured questionnaire for patients/clients. This was a nascent study, with a sample size of 22 respondents. The hospital has three departments; Organized Useful Rehabilitation Services (OURS), General Medical Services (GMS) and Eye Department (ED). All the departments of the hospital were represented in this study. Results: The hospital is a Church of Uganda founded, and runs a budget of 5 billion shillings ($ 1,351,351.4) annually, has multiple sources of funding including PHC funding annually and that, health services were delivered adequately to clients. Much as some services were accessed at no costs, other services like eye treatment were found expensive on the side of clients. The hospital’s hybrid mode of delivering health services through outreaches and facility-based services was cherished, however it had no ambulance and relied only on a hospital van.

Conclusions and Recommendations: Our study concludes that if private providers are supported under the partnership arrangement, they can adequately deliver services to the clients and decongest the public facilities. We recommend that the government devote more funds to support the hospital through employing more sub-seconded staff, procuring medicines, and ambulances to enable it to subsidize services especially eye treatment and other services not supported under the partnership.