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Work process of community health agents: possibilities and limits

The current study is aimed at getting to know and analyzing the work process of Community Health Agents (CHA) from a municipality of the Northeastern region of the state of Rio Grande do Sul, through a qualitative approach. The collection of data was carried out by means of a semi-structured interviewapplied to 23 CHAs. The Thematic Content Analysis was utilized for the data analysis. The results evidenced some possibilities, such as: communication with the participating families, establishing bonds, and recognition of/satisfaction towards the professional agent by the community; and, among some of the limits were: difficulty to perform team work; difficulty to perform collective tasks in the community; low salary/work overload and lack of qualification. Evidence shows the need of reorganizing the work process of these professionals with higher investment in education and instrumentation by adopting a permanent educational policy.

Family Health Program; Workers; Working conditions; Community health nursing


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