Contextual framework:

The problem-solving ability of healthcare is a concept associated with the final resolution of the problems the users bring to the health service.

Objective:

Know the motives that hamper the problem-solving ability of ophthalmological care in secondary healthcare from the user’s perspective and to identify suggestions to improve it.

Methods:

A qualitative-quantitative research was undertaken in a non-probabilistic sample of 208 patients, who were referred for ophthalmological care at a secondary health service in a city in the interior of São Paulo, Brazil. The interviews were recorded with the participants’ consent, transcribed, and analyzed, using the methodological strategy of the Collective Subject Discourse.

Results:

Countless motives delay the problem-solving ability of care, which are linked to bureaucracy, lack of human and material resources and the non-existence of referral and counter-referral in the organization of the healthcare network.

Conclusion:

The difficulties the users feel reflect this service’s lack of organization, which not only does not grant priority to care for the diabetic patients but does not commit either to proper forwarding or monitoring.

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