The bridging role of social work: the quest towards installing a structural approach within primary health care

Abstract

Primary health care is globally recognised as a key component of health systems. Its commitment to achieving social justice and addressing the social determinants of health is seen as a way to reduce social and health inequalities. As members of primary health care teams, social work professionals place the principle of social justice at the core of their operation by adopting a structural approach. Through this approach, social workers counter an exclusive focus on individual change and examine the social, political and economic forces that influence individual problems. However, little research has been done on the structural role of social work within primary health care. To address this issue, semi-structured interviews were conducted with 13 social workers from ten primary health care centres. Our findings are twofold. On the one hand, we conceptualise social workers’ role as a bridge in which they shape their structural approach incrementally on the micro, meso and macro levels. On the other, we address a few points of concern regarding some barriers to structural work identified by social workers.

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