ABSTRACT

Background: In South Africa the labor representation of employees by registered trade unions in health facilities is played by various health professionals. The interprofessional collaboration call and the worldwide experiences of health professionals regarding unfair labor practices and disharmony in rural Primary Health Care facilities have been of concern; South Africa is not an exception. The ability to balance the dual responsibilities of representing health professionals and committing to work role and responsibilities as prescribed remains a challenge. The study explored the experiences of health professionals and unions secure collaborative partnerships in rural and semi-rural comprehensive community centers (CHCs)

Objectives: The aim is to explore experiences of the health professionals and trade union collaborative partnership for secure workplace in the six rural and semi-rural comprehensive health centers (CHC) from three provinces. The collaboration culture is perceived as a strategy to resolve challenges between workers and maximize use of resources.

Methods: The study has adopted the mixed-methods research approach, the quantitative and qualitative methods that encompass the explorative, descriptive, and analytic research designs to triangulate the health professionals’ experiences on the role of organized labor in six rural comprehensive health centers (CHC). Purposive sampling was used to select the 42 participants on quantitative and 26 respondents for qualitative participants. Ethical measures were applied throughout the study.

Results: The SPSS quantitative data analysis and seven thematic themes emerged from the qualitative data. Both the quantitative and qualitative results were compared to confirm that the role of organised labour is silent and missing to advance safe collaboration and partnerships between health professionals and organised labour. Management sabotage the weak sparsely distributed union representatives in CHCs.