Norehan Abdullah

Healthcare Utilization by Older Age Groups in Northern States of Peninsular Malaysia: The Role of Predisposing, Enabling and Need Factors

Determining factors that affect healthcare utilization by the elderly is vital for the health system to be more responsive in providing care to this vulnerable group. The main objective of this paper is to identify the effect of the predisposing, enabling, and need factors on doctor visits and in-patient care for the elderly residing in the northern region of Malaysia. A multistage cluster sampling was used in selecting the sample for the study. A total of 1414 respondents aged 60 and over were interviewed face-to-face using a structured questionnaire. A probit model was used in estimating the utilization equations. At a significance level of 0.05, except for age, all predisposing and enabling factors were not statistically significant in affecting the doctor visits. On the other hand, being a male, smoker, medical insurance holder or had not actively involved in social interaction within the reference period increases the likelihood of being in-patient. Health-related variables remain the most significant factors that determine healthcare utilization, including both doctor visits and in-patient stays, in the area of study, which suggests that government policies to improve population health may influence the level of healthcare use in the future.

Job Happiness Among Local Youth in Sabah and Sarawak Towards Working in Oil Palm Plantation

The rapid expansion of oil palm plantation in Malaysia in 1990, 2.03 million hectares to 5.73 million hectares in 2016 caused required high labour intensive in this sector. Sabah and Sarawak were the main contributor of oil palm plantation which represented 33.30 percent among the states of Malaysia. More than 78% of labours (Azman, 2014) in these sectors mainly came from Indonesia, Bangladesh and Philippines and most of the local youth refused to participate in an oil palm plantation due to the working environment compared to manufacturing sector which more conducive. Hence, this contributes instability and unsustainability in the oil palm industry due to more dependence on foreign labour. The negative perception of local youth on nature of work and social status as a 4D job (Difficult, Dangerous, Dirty and Demeaning) made this working in oil palm plantation is the last choice of job among those who were still working and already left from oil palm plantation (Zaki et al., 2015). Thus, the objective of this paper is to explore the level of job happiness among oil palm plantation local youth which still working and those who left in this both states and analysing the factors contribute to their satisfaction and happiness level. The purposive randomised sampling among the 98 local youths aged ranging from 16 to 40 years old which was considered as the youth category and staying within the location 5 kilometres radius within the plantation area those who are still working and working before in this oil palm sector. The Partial Least Square was used to analyse the satisfaction and happiness level among this category of this group. The result found those who left from working in the plantation sector showed more significant value compared to those who are still working. This showed the construction reflects the satisfaction and happiness level if the plantation sector fulfilled the intrinsic factors of job satisfaction and happiness.