Patient Perspectives on Using Primary Care in Singapore: The Influence of System Context on Lived Experience and Health Policy

In Singapore’s primary care system, patients can choose any public or private physician and often use more than one provider to meet their primary care needs. This presentation will describe a qualitative study to understand 48 Singapore adults’ primary care usage patterns, their valuing of continuity of care, and the factors influencing both. Data collection occurred prior to and early in Singapore introducing the Healthier SG programme, a large-scale government initiative to shift Singapore’s primary care system to where patients “choose and enroll with a family doctor.” Results from this study also speak to the wider literature around patient choice of providers and primary care use patterns in other health care systems.

Objectives:

• Understand Singapore’s primary care system and patient perspectives on using this system
• Understand the importance of considering health care system context for health policy design