THAI VILLAGE HEALTH VOLUNTEERS: CAPACITIES FOR PROVIDING COMMUNITY-BASED AGED CARE

摘要

Village health volunteers have a long history in Thailand. Their major roles are to provide self-care and to communicate health information to people, including the elderly, in a community. This study aimed to assess their capacities in providing community-based aged care using empowerment assessment rating scales. The instrument qualitatively assessed nine community empowerment domains: participation, leadership, organizational structure, program management, problem assessment, asking-why (critical assessment of a problem), resource mobilization, links with others and roles of outside agents. Each domain comprised five phrases representing levels of capacities. Two groups of village health volunteers participated and were separately assessed for the capacities using a workshop approach, in which the participants actively engaged in the assessment. The phrases in each domain that closely reflected the capacities were chosen and could be altered to describe actual situations. Both groups demonstrated their most developed strengths in program management and resource mobilization. For example, they received sufficient support for their community projects, such as social visits to the elderly. The least developed capacities included participation, problem assessment and asking-why. For example, community members did not have an active role in defining community health problems of the elderly. This study suggests that involving community members in problem assessment and promoting effective information sharing among village health volunteers are key strategies to improve capacities of village health volunteers, especially in the least developed domains, in providing aged care in a community.