Why are family doctors important?
You may not have have heard of the late Professor Barbara Starfield, but her research in this area is essential reading to show why family medicine and primary health are important, cost effective and give excellent health outcomes. Following is a PDF hosted by globalfamilydoctor.com the official website of the World Organization of National Colleges, Academies and Academic Associations of General Practitioners/Family Physicians in short known as WONCA which deals with this topic.
Screening: harms and benefits
Screening is an attempt to prevent future disease but screening itself can be harmful. FM doctors should have a good idea what the harms and benefits are.
- Screening : Harms and benefits – list of some essential tables
Tobacco Legacy Documents – how companies can affect health
Family doctors deal with patients and their health choices which in turn are determined in large part by their lifestyle choices. What are the factors that affect people’s choices? How well do companies exploit this behaviour? The University of California offers an eye opening perspective through their collection of the documents from the tobacco industry which show their advertising, manufacturing, marketing, scientific research and political activities. Reading the main presentations will give the family doctor an essential insight into these and hopefully allow us to help patients recognise the impact of such factors on their life and health.
- Marketing to Special Populations (backup link)
- Marketing to Women (backup link)
- Marketing to Youth (backup link)
- Tobacco and Health (backup link)
- Secondhand smoke (backup link)
Well hats off to the RCGP in the UK for trying to roll out this exam all over the world. The aim is to try and improve the standard of General Practice (as it is called in the UK) or Family Medicine (in many other parts of the world). Following are links to some of Blog Posts dealing with the exam and a treasured case list!