Readiness of Government Hospitals to Implement Performance-Based Contract Work Strategy: A Study of Regional Referral Hospitals in Uganda.

Abstract

TURYAGYENDA RUBATA DENNIS (2011-M191-10018) Readiness of Government Hospitals to Implement Performance-Based Contract Work Strategy: A Study of Regional Referral Hospitals in Uganda This study investigated the readiness of government to implement Performance-Based Contracts (PBC) in the Regional Referral Hospitals (RRHs) of Uganda. This was a follow-up on government‟s announcement that the only way to solve the challenges related to poor public sector service delivery is by employing all civil servants on a PBC strategy. This study was conceived due to the fact that little if anything had been done by the government in the preparation for implementation of this strategy which motivated the researcher to find out as to whether there was any documented evidence to this effect. The study was guided by three objectives which included: willingness of the health workers to participate in the performance-based contract strategy, availability of requirements and evaluation of tools in place for performance-based contract strategy in regional referral government hospitals. The study was conducted through a cross sectional survey and data were collected in the months of June and July 2012. Using questionnaires and interview techniques, data were collected from the sampled health workers and core management of the six RRHs under the study. The targeted population was all the 13 RRHs of Uganda but six were sampled out of this, following the performance league table of 2010/2011 by MOH Uganda, considering the best and worst three. The findings indicated that RRHs are not ready to roll up PBC strategy as most of the requirements for the PBC implementation were not found available and health workers were found not willing to work under the new strategy based on the current evaluation tools. Therefore, it is concluded that RRHs seem not to be ready for successful implementation of the PBC in RRHs. However, there should be improvement in the health workers‟ salary scale, their requirements and provision of an evaluation tool that is efficient, effective and relevant to them. Key Words: Readiness, Government, Implement, Performance, Contract Work Strategy, Regional Referral Hospitals