Knowledge And Attitude Towards National Health Insurance Scheme Among Federal Civil Servants In Ibadan, Oyo State

Abstract

The continued stagnating healthcare system in Nigeria is of great social and economic consequence, as the deregulation of healthcare financing and supply in Nigeria has further shifted the healthcare system towards competitive market. It was found that despite the increase in most components of health care spending in Nigeria, the health status of the average Nigerian and the condition of health infrastructure has not improved appreciably. Thus an urgent need for a sustainable and equitable strategy to eliminate physical and financial barriers to health care is highly desired. Several works has been done on opinion and awareness about National Health Insurance Scheme but little has been done on knowledge and attitude towards National Health Insurance Scheme especially as far as federal civil servants is concerned, therefore, this study investigated the knowledge and attitude of Federal civil servants in Ibadan, Oyo state towards National Health Insurance Scheme. The study was carried out using descriptive research design of survey and correlation types and data was analysed using descriptive statistics, Chi-square and Pearson Product Moment Correlation. Five hundred and forty six (546) respondents were used. Knowledge of Benefits of NHIS Questionnaire (KBNHISQ) r= 0.74, Knowledge of Objectives of NHIS Questionnaire (KONHISQ) r=0.78, Attitudes Towards the Benefits of NHIS Questionnaire (ATBNHISQ) r= 0.71 and Utilization of NHIS Questionnaire (UNHISQ) r= 0.79 were the instruments used for data collection. The study tested six hypotheses. Three of the six hypotheses were rejected while the remaining three were accepted. There was no significant knowledge of the benefits (X²cal = 30.124, X²crit =30.144, df =19, p> 0.05), knowledge of the objectives (X²cal = 12.205, X²crit =18.307, df =10 p> 0.05) and positive attitude (X²cal = 24.806, X²crit =28.869, df =18 p> 0.05) towards the National Health Insurance Scheme among Federal civil servants in Ibadan, Oyo state, Nigeria. There was a significant utilization (X²cal = 29.667, X²crit =21.026, df =12 p< 0.05). a significant positive correlation was found between knowledge of benefit and utilization (r= 0.483, p>0.05) as well as between knowledge of benefit and utilization (r= 0.667, p<0.05) of National Health Insurance Scheme among Federal civil servants in Ibadan, Oyo state, Nigeria. The study concluded that NHIS scheme has finally taken off in Nigeria, but with a low awareness of the operations, components, objectives, benefits and mode of operation of the scheme among the formal sector or civil service and many workers are however willing to participate in the scheme, it was therefore recommended that government and other stakeholders in the scheme need to continue to organize awareness programmes that will sustain this interest among workers in the formal sectors.

Keywords: Health Insurance, Health status, Healthcare, Knowledge, Attitude

DOI: 10.7176/JEP/16-12-05

Publication date: November 30th 2025