Recruitment and retention of healthcare professionals in the public health sector : focus at the Limpopo Department of Health

Abstract

Recruitment and retention of healthcare professionals particularly, clinicians such as medical specialists and medical doctors is seen as a major challenge in the developing countries such South Africa. High vacancy rate of medical specialists and medical doctors at Regional and Tertiary hospitals presents an evidence of inability to attract and retain these categories of healthcare professionals in the health sector. This paper undertakes to reflect key recruitment and retention strategies of medical specialists and medical doctors for service delivery improvement specifically, the provision of quality health care services in the health sector. This paper sought to analyse recruitment and retention strategies that may be considered for the provision of quality health care services. In the process of analysing these recruitment and retention strategies, literature review was considered to determine various recruitment and retention strategies in the public health sector. It is observed that there are various key recruitment and retention strategies for scarce skills of clinicians such as medical specialists and medical doctors that may be considered to enhance the health system for the provision of quality health care services in the health sector. These recruitment and retention strategies among others include, monetary incentives, promoting work autonomy, career development, flexible working time and shift work, safety in the workplace and leadership and management.