Under the current conditions of open access to information from numerous databases, an individual can easily be affected by many factors while deciding whether to use health services or not. Among them, the personal, environmental, and social ones should be stressed. Their combination can often lead to inappropriate assumptions regarding the quality of healthcare services and the necessity to appeal to them, which will be discussed below.
A person’s mind is made of experience and knowledge that form the ability to make various conclusions. For instance, an individual could have faced insignificant treatment in a particular clinic. Given these individuals’ personal traits, they can extrapolate such an experience to other healthcare institutions and decide not to visit them without a severe need (Ang et al., 2022). Unfortunately, the described scenario is quite widespread even in developed countries, given people’s varying access to the related services.
The above situation is closely related to the environmental factors that can affect one’s decision to visit a physician – for example – or not. When a person lives in a disadvantaged area (like a ghetto), there is a high probability that healthcare providers offer poor services and do not possess high-quality equipment. People will not visit a hospital in such a case because there is a possibility that they will make their state even worse (Ang et al., 2022). They can easily decide to use the Internet to search for a correct treatment that cannot be considered appropriate.
Then, within the framework given, social factors are also crucial as well. When the closest relatives and friends promote a healthy lifestyle, visit doctors, and use health services regularly, a person will follow their example and adhere to such good practices. Thus, the discussed factors seem to be perceived as a complex phenomenon, given that they affect an individual simultaneously.
Reference
Ang, Y. T. I., Gan, S. W. S., Liow, C.H., Phang, C. C., Choong, H. L. L., & Lui, P (2022). Patients’ perspectives of home and self-assist hemodialysis and factors influencing dialysis choices in Singapore. Renal Replacement Therapy, 8.