Attracting and retaining health workers in rural areas: investigating nurses' views on rural posts and policy interventions.

Background: Kenya has bold plans for scaling up priority interventions nationwide, but faces major human resource challenges, with a lack of skilled workers especially in the most disadvantaged rural areas.

Methods: We investigated reasons for poor recruitment and retention in rural areas and potential policy interventions through quantitative and qualitative data collection with nursing trainees. We interviewed 345 trainees from four purposively selected Medical Training Colleges (MTCs) (166 pre-service and 179 upgrading trainees with prior work experience).