Department of Family Medicine and Primary Care, Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences, Stellenbosch University, Cape Town.
S Afr Fam Pract (2004). 2024 May 8;66(1):e1-e8. doi: 10.4102/safp.v66i1.5904.
Family medicine has trained specialist family physicians in South Africa since 2008, but not investigated their career pathways. The study aimed to determine the career pathways of newly qualified family physicians between 2008 and 2022.
A cross-sectional descriptive survey of all 186 family physicians via an electronic questionnaire.
Response rate was 44.6% (83/186). Overall, 9.6% emigrated, 10.8% were no longer practising, and 79.5% were still practising in South Africa. Of the latter, 14.5% were in the private sector, 55.4% in the public sector and 9.6% in both. Of those in the public sector, 33.7% were in specialist family physician posts, 12% in medical officer posts, 4.8% in managerial positions and 4.8% in academic positions. Issues relating to safety and security were important to those working in both sectors and relationships with colleagues in the clinical team, to those in the public sector. Overall, participants practised near or within their province of training and were not equitably distributed.
Only a third of graduates were in specialist family physician posts in the public sector. Attention needs to be given to retaining more graduates in such posts to achieve the goals of the national position paper. The proportion in the private sector was lower than expected. The reasons for no longer practising medicine should be further explored.Contribution: This is the first study on the career pathways of family physicians in South Africa since the new speciality was created. Understanding these pathways will assist with human resources for health planning.
自 2008 年以来，南非的家庭医学一直在培训专业的家庭医生，但尚未调查他们的职业道路。本研究旨在确定 2008 年至 2022 年期间新合格家庭医生的职业道路。
通过电子问卷对所有 186 名家庭医生进行横断面描述性调查。
应答率为 44.6%（83/186）。总体而言，9.6%的人移民，10.8%的人不再行医，79.5%的人仍在南非行医。后者中，14.5%在私营部门，55.4%在公共部门，9.6%在两者兼有。在公共部门工作的人中，33.7%在专科家庭医生岗位，12%在医疗官岗位，4.8%在管理岗位，4.8%在学术岗位。安全和保障问题对两个部门的工作人员都很重要，而与临床团队同事的关系对公共部门的工作人员很重要。总体而言，参与者在培训所在省或附近行医，分布不均。
只有三分之一的毕业生在公共部门担任专科家庭医生。需要关注如何让更多的毕业生留在这些岗位上，以实现国家职位文件的目标。私营部门的比例低于预期。应进一步探讨不再行医的原因。
这是自南非创建新专业以来首次对家庭医生的职业道路进行的研究。了解这些途径将有助于进行卫生人力资源规划。
