ABSTRACT
The quality of service rendered by the private medical are in relation with the fees they charge, the conditions in public hospitals that forced city dweller to turn to private medical services; and the ability of this sub-sectors to shoulder the additional burden of maintaining professional ethics in the current economic condition of the Nation prompted the researcher to look at the funding and ownership structure of Private Medical Clinics and Hospitals in Urban Centers of the Northern States.
The work has established that the ownership of Private Medical Clinics or Hospitals is predominantly sole proprietorship.
Funding is generated mainly from personal savings and retained earning with very little use of bank facilities. This has restricted growth and development in this sub-sector, Funding problems is further compounded by the attitude of doctors to the ownership of clinics and hospitals.
Doctors form the majority of clinic owners and majority of them are not willing to let go the sole ownership structure
they currently operate even when they agree to the advantages of group ownership to the practice. Finally recommendations
are put forward for the aggressive financing of private medical service whith a call for government to recognise the
contribution of private medical services to National Health Plan and to put forward policy that will make funding private
medical practice attractive. Doctors are also advised to acquire some management and financial education, in order
to modify their attitude to business ownership. It is the researcher's believe that when the recommendations are fully
and objectively implemented, funding of private medical care will improve greatly and the improvement will reflect on the
quality of service provided by the Sub-sector.
