Ensuring Public Healthcare Service and Health Rights in Communities through Participatory Health Governance

Page: 466-469
Jacob Islary (Department of Social Work, Assam Don Bosco University, Guwahati, Assam)

Ensuring good health in communities is a challenge. Field experience shows that community participation in public health governance ensures better health outcomes. It ensures regularity of health workers attendance, availability of drugs, maintenance of the health center, and the reach of health care service to interior and difficult areas. This article is a reflection on the experience of a community where people came together along with the state players to revive a defunct Primary Health Center using a participatory approach. The paper argues that while the approach ensured better service delivery and improved health outcome it also educates the community members of their rights, responsibilities and duties and empowers them to claim their rights with dignity and largely improving the health status. While public health governance is a complex process involving multiple players at global, national and local levels; at the community level participatory governance of health center could include involvement of community leaders, student union members, youth, women, NGOs and community members at large. It could be concluded that promoting participatory governance rather than bureaucratic administration is effective in delivery of health care services in rural areas.