Managers’ Views on Professional Competencies for Primary Health Care

Abstract

The article aimed to understand the view of managers of Primary Health Care Units about the competencies needed to exercise this function. This is qualitative research, conducted in the network of primary health care in Maceió, Alagoas, Brazil, with the participation of eight managers. Semi-structured interviews were performed, and for the treatment of the material, we used the Reflexive Thematic Analysis. The analysis resulted in the themes resulted: area of training, territorialization, work processes, and flows, emotional preparation, leadership, active posture, empathic availability, and professional self-realization. It was considered that the competencies valued by the participants fit the emphasis of the accountability model and incentives for performance. In the field of primary health care, this suggests a retraction toward the implementation of comprehensive health care practices adopted as a political guideline since the consolidation of the Unified Health System, and a reorientation of the route that goes back to the model of care centered on the individual and procedures, limiting care to biomedical care—a phenomenon that has been increasing in recent years in Brazil.