TY - BOOK AU - Raghda Mostafa Mostafa Elsayed AU - Maha Mohamed Ghobashi , AU - Mohamed Hani Shehata , AU - Rehab Abdelhai Ahmed , TI - Maternity patient out of pocket expenditures in obstetric and gynecology department at Kasr Al-Ainy / PY - 2015/// CY - Cairo : PB - Raghda Mostafa Mostafa Elsayed , KW - Catastrophic expenses KW - Health financing KW - Out of pocket expenses N1 - Thesis (M.Sc.) - Cairo University - Faculty of Medicine - Department of Community Medicine; Issued also as CD N2 - Methods: All females aged 15-49 years were identified for inclusion in the study sampling frame. A simple random sample of 300 females was selected from this sampling frame. Patients were interviewed with a semi-structured, in-depth questionnaire. Results: All interviewees incurred substantial out-of-pocket expenditures for travel, hospital admission fees, medicine, tests, food, and tips. Only two of the expenditures, travel expenses and admission fees, were not supposed to be provided free of charge by the hospital. The median total per-patient expenditure was L.E 235 (range L.E 3{u2013}L.E 5574). One third of all patients reported that their families had to borrow to pay for care at interest rates of 0%. 3.3% of these families reported selling jewelry, livestock or household items. The rural patients expenditures were higher than the urban patients. Factors increasing the expenditures were duration of hospitalization, rural residence, and necessary (e.g. C-section) medical procedures. Conclusion: Free maternity services in Egypt impose large out-of-pocket expenditures on patients. Authorities could reduce the burden by reducing the duration of hospital stays, limiting use of medical procedures, eliminating tips, and moving routine services closer to potential users UR - http://172.23.153.220/th.pdf ER -