Status and equity of medical personnel allocation in urban community health service centers in Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region

Objective To examine the status of medical personnel allocation in urban community health centers in Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region(Guangxi) and to evaluate the equity of the allocation.Methods A survey was conducted among 3 422 medical professionals working during 2013 at 133 urban community health service centers in Guangxi using a self-designed questionnaire in August 2014.Lorenz curve and Gini coefficient were used to analyze the equity of the medical personnel allocation.Results Among the 3 050 medical professionals with eligible response, the male to female ratio was 1:3.6 and the physician to nurse ratio was 1.3:1;41.44% were at the ages of 25-34 years;48.07% had college education;26.69% had the professional work experience of 5-9 years;and 41.74% were with primary professional titles. The ratios of the professionals with senior, secondary, and primary title were 1:6.3:8.8.The Gini coefficients for the service population-based(service area-based) allocation of practice or assistant physicians, registered nurses, pharmacists, clinic laboratory professinals, and image examination professionals were 0.378(0.679), 0.294(0.625), 0.354(0.652), 0.359(0.654), and 0.465(0.636), respectively.Conclusion There are imbalances in gender, age, and professional title ratios(more female and younger but less senior title) for the medical professionals allocation in urban community health centers in Guangxi and the equity of service population-based allocation is more superior to that of service area-based allocation.