Moghaddam Hamed Rezakhani, Allahverdipour Hamid, Matlabi Hossein
Department of Health Education and Promotion, Faculty of Health Sciences, Tabriz University of Medical Sciences, Tabriz, Iran,
J Multidiscip Healthc. 2018 Oct 26;11:621-634. doi: 10.2147/JMDH.S180544. eCollection 2018.
Women health volunteers (WHVs) are a link between people and healthcare workers. Despite their key role in promoting community health, strategies are rarely designed to keep them volunteering. The aim of this research was to find successful strategies to overcome barriers to recruitment and retention of the volunteers in assigned activities.
A three-round online national Delphi technique was used to ask the opinions of Iranian health volunteers' supervisors and the relevant researchers. At the first round, the participants were asked ten open-ended questions across four barriers: inadequate capability of the volunteers and trainers, inadequate acceptance of the volunteers, restrictive social norms, and organizational problems. At the second round, with the questionnaire consisting of closed-ended questions, the experts were asked to rank the feasibility of each strategy using a seven-point Likert scale. Items along with the feedback received from the second round were included in the third-round questionnaire. Strategies with a median of 6 or higher and with an interquartile range ≤1 were regarded to be feasible.
Consensus was obtained on 100 of the 133 strategies. A mixture of improving group work, implementing motivation tactics, assessing the needs of people/WHVs, reforming policy, monitoring and evaluation of WHVs/trainers, mobilizing the community, empowering WHVs/trainers, rationalizing WHVs/trainers/people, improving intersectional collaboration, implementing problem-based approaches, allocating proper resources, appropriate recruitment of WHVs, using social networks, and information dissemination were found to be the effective strategies to overcome the barriers to active participation.
The highest consensuses among experts were on implementing motivation tactics and mobilizing the community. It seems that community mobilization, incentives, and logistical supplies such as providing prizes and transportation facilities for volunteers are mechanisms that can help retain WHVs and also overcome barriers to their active participation.
女性健康志愿者是民众与医护人员之间的纽带。尽管她们在促进社区健康方面发挥着关键作用，但却很少有旨在让她们持续志愿服务的策略。本研究的目的是找到成功的策略，以克服在指定活动中招募和留住志愿者的障碍。
采用三轮在线全国德尔菲技术，征求伊朗健康志愿者主管和相关研究人员的意见。在第一轮中，向参与者提出了涉及四个障碍的十个开放式问题：志愿者和培训人员能力不足、对志愿者的接受度不够、社会规范限制以及组织问题。在第二轮中，问卷由封闭式问题组成，要求专家使用七点李克特量表对每个策略的可行性进行排名。第二轮收到的项目及反馈意见被纳入第三轮问卷。中位数为6或更高且四分位间距≤1的策略被视为可行。
在133项策略中的100项上达成了共识。发现一系列策略是克服积极参与障碍的有效策略，包括改进团队合作、实施激励策略、评估民众/女性健康志愿者的需求、改革政策、对女性健康志愿者/培训人员进行监测和评估、动员社区、增强女性健康志愿者/培训人员的权能、使女性健康志愿者/培训人员/民众合理化、改善跨部门协作、实施基于问题的方法、分配适当资源、适当招募女性健康志愿者、利用社交网络以及信息传播。
专家们最高的共识是实施激励策略和动员社区。社区动员、激励措施以及后勤供应，如为志愿者提供奖品和交通设施，似乎是有助于留住女性健康志愿者并克服其积极参与障碍的机制。
