Abstract

As health services at primary level, the program of family doctors has been started since 1996 in some regencies and municipalities. Conducted by PT Askes (health insurance) and family doctors themselves through mass media and direct communication to community and a number of institutions in order to improve the utilization of the services. However, the performance of family doctors needs further assessment. In fact, the assessment of community satisfaction was very important to demonstrate the performance of family doctors program. The aim of this study was to assess the utilization and satisfaction of family doctor program by PT Askes (health insurance) members. The research was a cross-sectional study and was done in 2003. The study took the location at Malang Regency and Malang Municipality, East Java Province. Result of the study has indicated that community participation in family doctors was tend to improve as the result of promotion efforts conducted by PT Askes (health insurance). However, the promotion from health centers, mass media, and radio, was still very low. The result of the study would recommend that family doctor program needs to be strengthened, including promotion methods of family doctors and the programs for curative and preventive efforts, so family doctors could develop a more effective communication with the community and could conduct a kind of health community development in their coverage area.