Determinants of health promotion service consumption in Thailand

Abstract

Despite being preventable, noncommunicable diseases (NCDs) rank among leading causes of death in Thailand. Four main groups of NCDs involve cardiovascular diseases, cancers, chronic respiratory diseases, and diabetes. These chronic diseases worsen economic burden and the quality of life. To ease the burden, health promotion service is one of the tools that can directly cope with risk factors of NCDs. Therefore, increasing health promotion service consumption potentially leads to risk reduction of an individual to develop NCDs. Hence, this research aims to identify the factors influencing health promotion service consumption in Thailand along with marginal effects of each factors. The analysis applies backward stepwise logistic regression with the national-level data from National Statistical Office of Thailand (NSO) collected in 2015. Overall, factors affecting health promotion service consumption for Thai male and female are different. At 1 percent significance level, Thai male’s probability of utilizing health promotion services is positively influenced by status of having chronic diseases, education, better score of self-assessment on health comparing with others, and age. The unhealthy behavioral factors including preference of adding extra-seasoning, alcohol consumption, and smoking negatively impact the probability of health promotion service consumption. For Thai female, at 1 percent significance level, the prospect to utilize health promotion services increases when she owns a road vehicle, has worse self-assessment on severe health condition, and grows older. On the other hand, the probability of health promotion service consumption plunges for an additional score on problem of self-caring. The other negative determinants on the chance of using health promotion services are smoking, preference of adding-extra seasoning, and living in municipal district.