The Curative Role of the Main Primary Health Facility in Indonesia: Analyzing Patient Visits at a Single PUSKESMAS with a Focus on General and Maternal-Child Health Clinics

Abstract

Aims: to analyze the curative role of a single PUSKESMAS based on the number of its patients visit with focus in its clinic which has the highest number of patient. Methodology: simple descriptive cross sectional approach on data of patients in PUSKESMAS Bogor Timur from July 2019 until December 2024. Results: This PUSKESMAS has 10 clinics, with total number of patients registered from July, 1st, 2019 until December, 31st 2024 was 97,934 patients; 33,873 [34.68%] male and 64061 [65.41%] female. Mean age of male patients was 34.13 (SD=0.125) while in the female patient was 33.68 (SD=0.84). the top three clinics visited by the patients were the general clinic with 54,628 patients [55.8%], the maternal and child health clinic with 24,371 patients [24.9%] and the supportive clinic (PUSKESMAS PEMBANTU) with 13,190 patients [13.5%]. Further analysis of the patients in the general clinic revealed that it handles 55.8% from the whole PUSKESMAS service and the maternal and child health clinic handle 24.9% of the whole patients. In these two clinics, all showed an increase in number of patient and also in yearly trend line from 2019 until 2024. The numbers revealed its hidden potency to up grade its service, qualitatively and also quantitatively. Conclusion:  PUSKESMAS is still the main backbone of Indonesia’s primary health facilities. The tendency to rise in number is very huge, and all stake holders must be aware of the positive and negative impact of the increment of patient population that come to the PUSKESMAS.