Quantifying Staff Preferences for Workforce Retention Strategies in Remote Australian Primary Health Care Services

Area of Science:

• Health Services Research
• Rural Health
• Workforce Management

Background:

• Remote Australian communities face significant health disparities.
• Persistent workforce shortages and high staff turnover in remote primary health care settings impact care delivery.
• Understanding staff retention preferences is crucial for improving workforce stability.

Purpose of the Study:

• To establish criteria for selecting methods to measure remote primary health care workers' retention preferences.
• To compare six different methodological approaches against these criteria.

Main Methods:

• Key criteria for methodology selection include logistical considerations, staff diversity, participant burden, preference quantification, socio-cultural appropriateness, bias minimization, and resource constraints.
• Six methods were compared: Rating, Ranking, Best Worst Scaling (BWS) Object Case, BWS Profile Case, BWS Multi-profile Case, and Discrete Choice Experiments (DCE).

Main Results:

• The Best Worst Scaling Object Case (BWS Object Case) methodology demonstrates significant advantages for measuring preferences in remote primary health care settings.
• This approach allows for quantified results that can inform practical retention initiatives.

Conclusions:

• The BWS Object Case method is highly suitable for assessing remote primary health care workers' retention preferences.
• Findings support the development of actionable, culturally appropriate, and cost-effective retention strategies for remote health workforces.