Support and performance improvement for primary health care workers in low- and middle-income countries: a scoping review of intervention design and methods.

Support and performance improvement for primary health care workers in low- and middle-income countries: a scoping review of intervention design and methods. Health Policy Plan. 2016 Dec 19;: Authors: Vasan A, Mabey DC, Chaudhri S, Brown Epstein HA, Lawn SD Abstract Primary health care workers (HCWs) in low- and middle-income settings (LMIC) often work in challenging conditions in remote, rural areas, in isolation from the rest of the health system and particularly specialist care. Much attention has been given to implementation of interventions to support quality and performance improvement for workers in such settings. However, little is known about the design of such initiatives and which approaches predominate, let alone those that are most effective. We aimed for a broad understanding of what distinguishes different approaches to primary HCW support and performance improvement and to clarify the existing evidence as well as gaps in evidence in order to inform decision-making and design of programs intended to support and improve the performance of health workers in these settings. We systematically searched the literature for articles addressing this topic, and undertook a comparative review to document the principal approaches to performance and quality improvement for primary HCWs in LMIC settings. We identified 40 eligible papers reporting on interventions that we categorized into five different approaches: (1) supervision an...
Source: Rural Remote Health - Category: Rural Health Authors: Tags: Health Policy Plan Source Type: research