Analysis of Accessibility to Healthcare Facilities in Giwa and Tofa Local Government Areas of Nigeria: GIS Approach

Aim: The objective of the National Health Policy (1988) in Nigeria is to provide the population with access to primary, secondary and tertiary healthcare as needed through a functional referral system. In this paper, Geographic Information System (GIS) is employed to examine a very important aspect of the policy, that is, accessibility to healthcare facilities in the rural areas which constitute a very large population of the country. Study Design: The situation in Giwa and Tofa Local Government Areas respectively in Kaduna and Kano States of North western Nigeria is examined, with a view to identify the patronage pattern and the level of accessibility to the healthcare facilities in the rural areas in order to guide healthcare policy formulation and implementation in Nigeria. Methodology: Locational access to healthcare facilities was established for all the 26 electoral wards across Giwa and Tofa LGAs. Using network analyst tool in ArcGIS, cost OD (Origin Destination) matrix was created using the population weighted centroid of each electoral ward as origins and the healthcare facilities as destinations. The average nearest neighbourhood analysis was done to determine the spatial randomness of the healthcare facilities. From these data, indices of community healthcare accessibility for the LGAs neighbourhoods were constructed. In addition, structured questionnaires were administered through a systematic random sampling to patients at the General hospitals in the LGAs and oral interviews conducted with those who do not patronise the hospitals. The data from the questionnaire survey was analysed using both the descriptive and inferential statistics. Results: Findings showed that healthcare facilities in some of the wards are grossly inadequate, their distribution is random hence many of the electoral wards are poorly served or underserved. Findings revealed that some people travel a distance of up to 30km to access the nearest healthcare facility. Conclusion: There is the need for provision of more healthcare centres in the areas which should be distributed fairly and logically.