Abstract
BackgroundHuman resource for health (HRH) challenges jeopardise the South African health system, undermining the efforts made to curb the burden of disease. There is a demand for a category of health workers, which will meet the basic health needs of people at the grassroots level to ensure accessible, affordable health care using appropriate technologies acceptable to the recipients of care. The ward-based primary health care outreach teams are well placed to provide community-based primary health care services, which encompass activities in communities, households and referral networks with community-based providers. This study aims to elicit factors enabling or undermining the effectiveness of ward-based primary health care outreach teams in KwaZulu-Natal.MethodsThe search strategy of this scoping review will be guided by Arksey and O’Malley’s scoping review methodology framework. The following electronic databases will be searched: PubMed, Google Scholar, Science Direct, Clinical key and from EBSCOhost platform and Dissertation via World Cat. The selection of study will involve three stages of screening. The principal author will conduct the title screen of articles from the databases and remove the duplicates. Two authors will independently conduct the abstract and full text screening, and articles that meet the eligibility criteria will be included for the study. Data will be extracted from the studies included, and the emerging themes will be analysed using NVIVO software. A quality assessment of the included studies will be determined through a mixed method appraisal tool (MMAT) version 2011.DiscussionWard-based primary health care outreach team (WBPHCOT) evidence, acceptability, preferences or practice effectiveness studies will be identified. Further expected results also include identification of knowledge gaps in primary health care practice as well as inform future research required. Findings will be disseminated electronically, in print and through peer presentation, conferences and congresses.Results from this scoping review will be useful to inform local and the South Africa National Health Insurance programme managers concerning the impact ward-based primary health care outreach teams have on the national health care system and on the health of the population.
Highlights
Human resource for health (HRH) challenges jeopardise the South African health system, undermining the efforts made to curb the burden of disease
Community health workers had their origins in China in the 1920s and were precursors to the “barefoot doctor” programme which was a movement in the 1950s [1,2,3]
In the 1960s, community health worker programmes emerged in Indonesia, India, Tanzania and Venezuela [3]
Summary
Human resource for health (HRH) challenges jeopardise the South African health system, undermining the efforts made to curb the burden of disease. Just over a decade later, an international conference on primary health care (PHC) was held at Alma Ata where a Declaration of Health for All by the year 2000 was made. The Alma Ata Declaration of 1978 articulated the urgent need for all governments, health and development workers and the communities, to protect and promote the health of all the people of the world [4]. The community health workers’ role in providing PHC was highlighted in the Declaration [5]. These categories of staff need to be suitably trained to work as a health team in order to respond to the identified and expressed health needs of the community. Community health worker programmes in low-, middle- and high-income countries proved to be successful in the 1980s in countries like Brazil (community health agents), Bangladesh (family welfare assistants) and Nepal (female community health volunteer programme) [3]
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