Division of Medical Education, University of Manchester, Manchester, UK.
Department of Psychology, Manchester Metropolitan University, Manchester, UK.
J Public Health (Oxf). 2019 Sep 30;41(3):593-599. doi: 10.1093/pubmed/fdy148.
Increasingly, public sector workers are being required to expand their roles into public health. Fire and rescue services, as part of the Emergency Medical Response trial, are at the forefront of role expansion, with increasing capacity due to reducing numbers of fires in recent years. Firefighter roles, successfully implemented, include responding to cardiac arrests and conducting checks on health and wellbeing in people's own homes. In this study, we explored fire service members' perceptions about this role expansion, to increase understanding of how role expansion can be introduced and supported.
We interviewed 21 firefighters and team members about their perceptions of new roles. Interviews were conducted, transcribed and thematically analysed until reaching thematic saturation.
Perspectives differed for responding to cardiac arrests and wellbeing checks. Cardiac arrests were seen as aligned with core roles and thus more acceptable. For both types of new role participants wanted more training and opportunities to provide feedback on implementation.
How team members viewed role expansion depended on new role alignment with core role, training and being able to give feedback to management to shape future services.
越来越多的公共部门员工被要求扩大其角色，承担公共卫生方面的工作。消防和救援服务部门作为紧急医疗响应试验的一部分，处于角色扩展的前沿，由于近年来火灾数量减少，其能力也在不断提高。成功实施的消防员角色包括对心脏骤停做出反应，以及在人们自己的家中对健康和福利进行检查。在这项研究中，我们探讨了消防队员对这种角色扩展的看法，以增加对如何引入和支持角色扩展的理解。
我们采访了 21 名消防员和团队成员，了解他们对新角色的看法。对访谈进行了记录、转录，并进行了主题分析，直到达到主题饱和。
对心脏骤停和健康检查的反应有不同的看法。心脏骤停被视为与核心角色一致，因此更容易被接受。对于这两种新角色，参与者都希望接受更多的培训，并提供实施情况的反馈机会。
团队成员如何看待角色扩展取决于新角色与核心角色的一致性、培训以及向管理层提供反馈以塑造未来服务的能力。
