Patient care evaluation in a primary health care programme: The use of tracer conditions as a simple and appropriate technology in health care delivery∗

Community-based health care programmes are being increasingly used to increase health care coverage, especially in developing countries. If such Primary Health Care (PHC) programmes are to effectively benefit communities for which they are designed, simple but effective evaluative procedures using readily available epidemiological data must be designed and used.

In this article tracer conditions (cough, diarrhoea and fever) are used to evaluate the quality of care provided by Community Clinic Attendants in rural districts served by the Brong-Ahafo Rural Integrated Development Programme (BARIDEP). 15 out of 30 Community Clinics of one attendant each were surveyed with 290 tracer observations among 200 patients of whom 95% “came for consultation with a new condition which had not been treated before by a CCA”.

In all the evaluation procedure was thought to be feasible and should provide an immediate and useful feedback which might be used to improve health provider performance through training programmes and general management of community clinics