Health service brokers in community-based primary health care: A scoping review

Context and aims ‘Innovative Models Promoting Access-to-Care Transformation’ is a collaborative research program that brings together communities in six regions across Australia and Canada with a research team to design innovations to improve access to primary health care for vulnerable people. One such innovation is the use of a health service broker. This poster will present the methodology for, and early findings from, a scoping review exploring how health brokers have been defined, characterised and used in primary health care. Additional analysis will explore the extent to which principles of patient-centred care have influenced these dimensions. Methods Scoping review of the literature based on Arksey and O’Malley’s (2005) framework. Evaluated studies will be set in OECD countries, conducted in community-based primary health care and published in English since 2000. Sources will be analysed according to key themes of broker models and patient-centred care. Findings The review question, ‘what is the extent and nature of the use of health service brokers’ will be answered, with a description of brokers, their components and patient-centredness. Innovative contribution to policy, practice and/or research The review findings will identify how brokers are used in primary health care and which components are conducive to patient-centred care. A discussion of the scoping review process will provide insight into using this methodology in primary health care research. Arksey, H., & O’Malley, L. (2005). Scoping studies: Towards a methodological framework. Int. J. Soc. Res. Meth., 8(1), 19-32.