Comparison of the Performance of Health Volunteers in the Health Centers of Shahid Beheshti University of Medical Sciences

Background and Objective: Health volunteers are the women who do charity work to prevent, protect and promote the health status of the covered neighbors and hereby cooperate with the health centers. The aim of this study was to compare the health volunteer's performance in the covered health centers by Shahid Beheshti University of Medical Sciences.Materials and Methods: This descriptive- analytical study was performed by the participation of 2060 Health volunteers, who were cooperating with 90 covered health centers by Shahid Beheshti University of Medical Sciences. These include Shomal, Shargh, Shemiranat, Pakdasht, Damavand and Firoozkooh. We used census sampling method. Demographic data was gathered through interviews with the health volunteers and their performance evaluated by the supervisor of the volunteers; through the evaluation forms and these data gathered together.Results: The mean (SD) of the health volunteers performance was 30.9 (16.4) in all centers. They were 35.1 (22) in Shargh, 34 (14.5) in Shomal, 32 (11.3) in Firoozkooh, 28.3 (14) in Shemiranat, 7.9 (9.2) in Damavand and 23.6 (8.5) in Pakdasht respectively. The mean (SD) of the efficacy of health volunteers was 8.6 (9.9) in all centers. They were 11.7 (5.6) in Firoozkooh, 10.7 (15.7) in Shargh, 9.4 (6.8) in Shomal, 7.9 (4.9) in Damavand, 7.9 (6.1) in Shemiranat and 4.6 (4.3) in Pakdasht respectively. Older and married volunteers with more experience performed better. There was no significant relationship between the efficacy of health volunteers with their literacy level, employment status and absorber of them.              Conclusion: The health volunteers of Shomal, Shargh and Firoozkooh had the best performances respectively. The performances of those in Shemiranat, Damavand and Pakdasht were less than the overall health centers’ mean score. The efficacy score of Firoozkooh, Shomal and Shargh health centers were above the overall health centers’ mean score respectively. Considering all factors, it seems that the efficacy of the health volunteers of Shomal and Pakdasht were the most and least suitable respectively.Keywords: Performance, Efficacy, Health volunteers, Responsibility, Empowerment programs, Healt