Comparative study on job motivation and job stress among urban and rural community health workers of Hubballi taluk in Karnataka

Background: Health workers account for the largest share of public expenditures on health and play a crucial role in efforts to improve the availability and quality of health services. The performance of community health worker depends on their job satisfaction which is derived from certain intrinsic and extrinsic motivators. Objectives were to compare the motivation and job stress among community health workers in Hubballi Taluk in Karnataka. Methods: Comparative cross-sectional study was conducted among 134 community health workers of 3 rural PHCs from Noolvi, Byahatti, Adargunchi, and 3 urban PHCs from Bantikatta, Ayodhyanagar, Navanagar of Hubballi taluk. After obtaining informed consent, data was collected using pretested structured questionnaire and 4 point Likert scale method used. Results: Out of 134 community health workers, 68 were from rural areas and 66 were from urban areas. In urban area 24.2% were ANMs and 75.8% were ASHA workers while in the rural 8.8% were ANMs and 91.2% were ASHA. 56.1% in the urban and 50% in the rural were aged between 31-40 years respectively. The mean score of total motivation was higher in urban (72.13) than in rural (70.04) and also mean score of total occupational stress was higher in urban (60.3939) than rural (58.5588). Conclusions: Our study showed that the motivation and job stress is more among the urban as compared to rural There is a need to motivate more in the rural health workers and reduce the job stress in urban area.