A quasihierarchical location-allocation model for primary health care planning

In studying primary health care (PHC) systems in developing countries, a quasihierarchical relationship between health centers and village clinics is identified; it is based not only on an organizational attachment of one or more village clinics to every health center, but also on the daily presence of a health-center-based physician at each clinic. A unique zero-one integer programming model is developed and applied to a PHC system in Jordan. The PHC coverage problem is explicitly addressed in the model; its objective is to enhance both the accessibility to PHC services and the availability of physician-provided services.