Abstract
Background: In South Africa, there is a large divide between public eye healthcare, which serves most of the country’s population, and private eye healthcare, which only serves a small portion. The majority of optometrists choose to go into private practice thus the public sector is under-serviced. This has led to visual disability being the most prevalent kind of disability measured in South Africa.
Aim: To identify the socio-demographic characteristics and motivating factors that these graduating optometrists in South Africa deem the most important when considering taking up a public sector position instead of a private one.
Methods: The selected study design was a quantitative cross-sectional research design. The data collection instrument used was a self-administered questionnaire, handed to all the graduating optometry students in South Africa, the total population was 180. The data was entered, cleaned and arranged in a Microsoft office excel sheet. It was analysed using SPSS. Descriptive analyses were conducted to determine the socio-demographic characteristics of graduating optometry students in South Africa that consider choosing the public sector and to describe differences in characteristics between the students that choose the public sector compared to private sector work.
Results: Thirty-nine students responded to the questionnaire (22% response rate). The majority of the students were willing to work in the public sector (46.2%). Statistically significant (p < 0.05) factors of these students were that they were from a rural area (88.9%), attended the University of Limpopo (72.2%) and identified as black (88.9%). The motivating factors that were deemed the most important were monthly salary (71.8%), benefits (51.3%) and clean (38.5%) and safe (33.3%) working conditions. A total of 78.3% either felt the Phelophepa train had a positive or very positive influence, with 81.6% reporting a similar experience with the clinical work they did in a public sector setting.
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Conclusion: South Africa is facing a significant visual disability issue, the most prevalent disability in the country. Preventable cases are left untreated due to the lack of optometrists in the public sector. This study showed that there are optometry students willing to choose positions in the public sector over lucrative private sector jobs. Existing vacancies should be advertised and outreaches such as the Phelophepa train promoted during clinical rotations. After more posts have been created, students need to be assured that the working conditions are safe, clean and adequately equipped. The remuneration packages need to be fair and attractively structured, allocating benefits and annual pay raises for long-term employees. Creating opportunities for students from rural backgrounds may lead to improving their socio-economic status as well as improving healthcare in their community.