Allied Health Activity: The Challenges of Legitimising and Prioritising Meaningful Work
Date
Authors
McNicholl, Seamus G
Reid, Duncan
Bright, Felicity
Supervisor
Item type
Journal Article
Degree name
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
Physiotherapy New Zealand
Abstract
With growing service demand and constrained budgets, allied health services across New Zealand hospitals are focused on prioritising high-impact and high-value care. To inform understandings of what constitutes “high-value care”, this study aimed to identify what allied health service activities are valued in a New Zealand District Health Board (DHB) setting. Semi-structured interviews were used to explore the perceptions of patients (n = 2), allied health staff (n = 4), and managers (n = 3) within one DHB as an exemplar. Following transcription, the data were analysed using conventional content analysis. There were differing perspectives between each participant group on high-value allied health care. Important allied health workplace activities were grouped into three categories: building relationships, providing meaningful allied health care, and backstage workplace activity. This research reveals the differences in perspective between what patients value and what organisations value. This tension may mean that allied health professionals struggle to prioritise and legitimise those aspects of care that matter most to patients.Description
Keywords
1103 Clinical Sciences, 4201 Allied health and rehabilitation science, Allied Health, High-value Activity, Meaningful Work, Prioritisation, Workplace Activity
Source
New Zealand Journal of Physiotherapy, ISSN: 0303-7193 (Print); 2230-4886 (Online), Physiotherapy New Zealand, 54(1), 8-18. doi: 10.15619/nzjp.v54i1.499
Publisher's version
Rights statement
The New Zealand Journal of Physiotherapy is registered on Scopus, and since 2012, has offered Open Access publication of all content. Present and future journal articles are freely accessible as well as past journals that have been published from 2012 onwards. There are no author fees for publication.