Work Engagement in Portugal´s National Continues Care Network Professionals

Abstract

The national network of integrated continuing care is one of the most recent responses of the Portuguese National Health System. It is therefore crucial to carry out studies that assess this response, but also focus on the professionals who ensure the provision of care on a daily basis. Knowledge about work engagement of professionals is essential to improve the quality of these organizations. Work Engagement is an indicator of the relationship between the professionals and the work environment and is an important factor in performance and productivity. The aim of this study was to evaluate levels of engagement among these professionals. The data collection instrument consisted of a sociodemographic and professional questionnaire, and the Utrecht Work Engagement Scale short version (UWES-9) by Schaufeli and Bakker (2003), translated and adapted for the Portuguese population by Sinval et al. (2018). In a universe of about 1000 professionals from different units, 240 individuals were studied. The results obtained show that professionals have high work engagement values. There were statistically significant differences in the means of work engagement, taking into account the sociodemographic variables, marital status (F=-4.28; p=0.006) and age group (F=3.476; p=0.009) and socio-professional, classification in the remuneration (t=-5.015; p<0.001), professional experience (t=-3.343; p<0.001) and professional category (F=6.385; p=0.002). Regression analyses that showed a R square determination coefficient value, obtained, 12,4% of the variance in work engagement can be explained by the demographic and job features variables.