Aging village doctors in five counties in rural China: situation and implications.
Background: The aging population, rapid urbanization, and epidemiology transition in China call for the improvement and adaptation of the health workforce, especially in underserved rural areas. The aging of village doctors (the former "barefoot doctors") who have served the rural residents for many...
| Publicado en: | Human Resources for Health Vol. 12; no. 1; pp. 36 - 37 |
|---|---|
| Autores principales: | , , , , , , |
| Formato: | research Journal Article |
| Publicado: |
BioMed Central
2014
|
| Acceso en línea: | Ver este registro en EBSCOhost |
| fields | @attributes: recordID: 1 pdfLink: plink: https://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=ccm&AN=107797091&site=ehost-live header: @attributes: shortDbName: ccm uiTerm: 107797091 longDbName: CINAHL Complete uiTag: AN controlInfo: bkinfo: dissinfo: jinfo: jid: 14784491 1CPZ jtl: Human Resources for Health issn: 14784491 maglogo: N pubinfo: dt: 2014 vid: 12 iid: 1 pid: 24147 pub: BioMed Central artinfo: ui: 107797091 107797091 NLM24973946 2012646790 10.1186/1478-4491-12-36 NLM24973946 PMC4094459 107797091 ppf: 36 ppct: 1 formats: tig: atl: Aging village doctors in five counties in rural China: situation and implications. aug: au: Xu, Huiwen Zhang, Weijun Gu, Linni Qu, Zhiyong Sa, Zhihong Zhang, Xiulan Tian, Donghua affil: China Institute of Health, School of Social Development and Public Policy, Beijing Normal University, 19 Xinjiekou Wai Street, Haidian District, Beijing, China. tian65216@hotmail.com. sug: subj: Age Factors Community Health Workers Health Services Accessibility Physicians Rural Health Services Labor Supply Rural Population Adult Aged Aging China Female Human Income Prospective Studies Male Middle Age Pensions Questionnaires Adult: 19-44 years Aged: 65+ years Middle Aged: 45-64 years Female Male ab: Background: The aging population, rapid urbanization, and epidemiology transition in China call for the improvement and adaptation of the health workforce, especially in underserved rural areas. The aging of village doctors (the former "barefoot doctors") who have served the rural residents for many decades has become a warning signal for the human resources for health in China. This study aims to investigate the village doctors' aging situation and its implications in rural China.Methods: The data reviewed were obtained from the baseline survey of a longitudinal study of rural health workforce in five counties in rural China in 2011. Using a stratified multi-stage cluster sampling process, the baseline data was collected through the self-administered structured Village Doctor Questionnaire. Descriptive analyses, correlation analyses, and multivariate linear regression with interaction terms were conducted with the statistics software Stata 12.0.Results: The average age of the 1,927 village doctors was 49.3 years (95% CI 48.8 to 49.9), 870 (45.2%) of whom were aging (50 years or older). Both the age and the recruitment time of the village doctors were demonstrated to have a bimodal distribution. A greater proportion of the male village doctors were aging. Furthermore, aging of the village doctors was significantly correlated to their education level, type of qualification, practicing methods, and their status as village clinic directors (P <0.05, respectively). As shown in the regression models, aging village doctors provided significantly more outpatient services to rural residents (P <0.01) but without an increase in income, and their expected pension was lower (P <0.01), compared with their non-aging counterparts.Conclusions: Aging of village doctors is a serious and imperative issue in China, which has a complex and profound impact on the rural health system. Greater attention should be paid to the construction of the pension system and the replenishment of the village doctors with qualified medical graduates. pubtype: Academic Journal doctype: research Journal Article ougenre: Article language: English refInfo: holdings: @attributes: islocal: N |
|---|