A review of generalist and specialist community health workers for delivering adolescent health services in sub-Saharan Africa

Table 1 Generalist versus specialist community health worker typology

	Generalist	Specialist
Recruitment	Community involved in identification and selection of potential CHWs
	Advertisement for candidates through multiple media outlets
	Criteria: 18 to 40 years of age, from local community, permanent resident, literate, motivated
Training	Initial: six months	Initial: one to two weeks
	On-the-job: six months	On-the-job: two weeks
	Ongoing: once per month
	Refresher: every six months
	Consists of didactic, interactive sessions	Consists of didactic, interactive sessions
	Core training	Core training
	Access resources, service coordination, crises management, knowledge of health services, leadership, organizational skills, interpersonal communication skills, confidentiality	Promotive, preventive, and therapeutic interventions
Job responsibilities	Many	Few
	Broad	Specific
Monitoring and evaluation	One supervisor per 20 to 25 CHWs
	Evaluation
	One annual internal evaluation
	One external evaluation every five years

ISSN: 1478-4491