Objective   To examine the situation of hospital visits and its association with self-rated treatment effect among poor elderly cataract patients in rural China.

  Methods   From annual database (2017 – 2019) of national system for dynamic management on rural health poverty alleviation, we extracted the information on 23 859 poor elderly (aged 60 years and above) with diagnosed cataract. Descriptive analysis and multi-category logistic regression analysis were conducted to explore the correlation between hospital visit and self-rated treatment effect among the participants.

  Results   Self-assessed cure or improvement of cataract after medication were reported by 90.0% of the participants. Of all the participants, 59.7% and 79.9% had their medication for cataract at secondary hospitals and at county-level medical institutions; 80.9% had only one hospital visit for cataract medication during the period of 2017 – 2019. The results of multivariate regression analysis showed that compared to those seeking medication at tertiary hospitals, the participants seeking medication at first-level hospital (odds ratio OR = 1.242, 95% confidence interval CI: 1.137 – 1.357) and second-level hospital (OR = 1.362, 95% CI: 1.270 – 1.460) were more likely to have a better self-rated treatment effect; while, the participants seeking medication at primary medical institutions were more likely to have a poor self-rated treatment effect (OR = 0.516, 95% CI: 0.461 – 0.578); the results also demonstrated that the participants with following characteristics were more likely to have a better self-rated treatment effect: seeking medication at hospitals outside of home county (OR = 1.458, 95% CI: 1.364 – 1.557) and having only one hospital visit for cataract medication during the three-year period (OR = 1.458, 95% CI: 1.364 – 1.557).

  Conclusion   For the period of 2017 to 2019, the self-rated disease improvement after medication is high and the treatment effect is closely related to seeking medication in hospitals at different levels among poor elderly cataract patients in rural China.