The ASHA (Accredited Social Health Activist) is a grass-root level worker, who is a bridge between the population and the health system. She works to decrease maternal morbidity and mortality and morbidity associated with diverse infectious diseases. The objective of this paper is to determine the challenges and hurdles faced by ASHA during their fieldwork in a rural area of district Jaipur, Rajasthan. Every day, millions of ASHAs, the grass-root level workers are engaged in bringing about behavioral change in a large population base. They are the bridge between the population and the health system, which strengthens the communication between both. To determine the challenges and hurdles faced by ASHA during their fieldwork in the rural area of district Jaipur, Rajasthan, this study was conducted. The findings indicate that 88% of all households were informed about child immunization through ASHA’s field visits. 54% of mothers had been informed about ARI during pregnancy to minimize complications for them and newborns through ASHA’s field visit. The regularity of travel to the village for domicile was low due to charges involved.
Awareness, motivation, and initial training provided by the Government to the ASHAs helps them to be motivated to work for a year, mainly in urban areas. But after that their working longevity, discipline, and quality of service deteriorates. This is because they had not been given necessary support systems such as transport facilities during field visits and continuous training. The main purpose of the study was to find out the problems/challenges faced by the ASHAs in their field works.
There are several challenges faced by ASHAs in discharging their duties, during the field works. Respondents were asked to provide information about their challenges faced by them; they mentioned that around 60% of ASHA (96) found problems in fulfilling their roles/duties during fieldwork, social stigma was identified as the main problem for 43% of ASHA. Around 20% of ASHA (30) reported that difficulties in traveling a long distance and heavy load of work are hindering factors. Few find workload is too large and lack administrative support from PHC for various reasons. Few (10%) did not inform about the challenges they face during work. Most of the ASHAs joined for financial gain (60%) which include supporting family, helping to meet family expenses, and supporting themselves as income was less in ASHA home. Around 40% of ASHAs joined because of the developed image and reputation of an ASHA in society. Around 20% of ASHAs didn’t want to join but due to social pressure caused by family, especially husband they had no choice but to join. Only 7% of them stated that they wanted to get a permanent job in the health sector.