The baseline survey was carried out by CIET in collaboration with the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare in early 1999. It provides information on perceptions and use of, and experience with, health and family planning services by the population of Bangladesh with a special focus on women and disadvantaged groups.

In addition to data from a national sample of some 26,207 households (134,926 people) in 250 sites across the country, focus groups to discuss the findings were held in 426 communities with men and women separately. The survey revealed that one in every three households in the country rated government health care services as bad, and one in every five said they had to make an extra, “unofficial” payment to the health workers for getting services. Only one in three users of government health services received all the required medicines and about half of the users were dissatisfied with the service they were given. CIET was able to quantify the improved satisfaction of service users that could result from increased availability of medicines, and a reduction in unofficial payments in government health facilities across the country.