Abstract

This presentation was based on data collected from 409 patients of two geographical locations, viz. Klang Valley, and others in Malaysia. The patients were under treatment in two groups of public hospitals. In one group there were 4 hospitals under the Ministry of health (MOH) and in another group, there were 2 hospitals under the Ministry of education (MOE). The number of investigated patients from the first group of hospitals was 287. The remaining investigated patients were from hospitals under the Ministry of Education. The percentage of patients from Klang Valley was 72.4. The preference of hospitals was significantly associated with patients of two locations. Marital status of patients and their choice of hospitals were significantly associated. Preference of hospitals was also significantly associated with each of household income, catastrophic health expenditure, physical preparedness, financial preparedness, appointment compliance, duration of dialysis, and duration of kidney transplantation. Out of these variables, the most important variable in discriminating patients of two groups of hospitals was catastrophic health expenditure followed by duration of dialysis, geographical location, financial preparedness, household income and some other variables. This phenomenon was noted from the results of discriminant analysis.

Keywords: Discriminant Analysis; Health care providers; Geographical location; Kidney transplant recipients; Transplant centre; Risk ratio; Sociodemographic characteristics

Abbreviations: ESKD: End Stage Kidney Diseases; MOH: Ministry of Health; KTRs: Kidney Transplant Recipients; CHE: Catastrophic Health Expenditure