Interprofessional collaboration in the Family Health Strategy: implications for the provision of care and work management

Abstract

Interprofessional collaboration is seen as a resource for tackling model of care and workforce problems. The scope of this study was to understand the perception about the shared work and interprofessional collaboration of professionals who work in primary health care. A qualitative study was conducted in São Paulo city. In-depth interviews were performed with professionals from distinct categories who worked in the Family Health Strategy and Support Center for Family Health. The results highlighted the empirical ‘professional interaction’ and ‘production goals’ categories. The forms of interaction, the role of specialized matrix support and the perspective in which production goals are perceived by the professionals pointed to tensions between traditional professional logic and collaboration logic. It also revealed the tensions between a model based on specialized procedures and a more collaborative model centered on health needs of families and of the community. The sharing of responsibilities and practices, changes in the logic of patient referral to specialized services and inadequate organizational arrangements remain major challenges to the integration of interprofessional collaboration for the development of new care practices.

Key words Interprofessional relations; Cooperative behavior; Primary health care