Change of trend in Primary Care. The Spanish Society of General and Family Physicians (SEMG) warns of the anonymization of doctors in outpatient clinics. “We are afraid that the patient does not have an assigned family doctor,” says SEMG spokesperson, Dr. Lorenzo Armenteros del Olmo.
According to the society, in some centers doctors’ labels are starting to disappear. “Before, the name of the doctor who had to treat you appeared on the health card and now in many cases it did not,” explains the president of the SEMG, Pilar Rodríguez.
But, What is the reason for the change in trend? Professionals attribute this mainly to the lack of professionals in Primary Care, causing many vacancies to remain unfilled. Furthermore, we must add the fact that the current workforce is made up of older workers, many of them about to retire, and there is no generational change.
The doctors explain that family medicine is a specialty rarely selected by MIR students. In fact, on numerous occasions these positions have been left unfilled. “We must change this trend and make it attractive again for new generations,” says Armenteros del Olmo.
On the other hand, professionals warn that the profile of patients who come for consultation has also changed. Now, the seats in the waiting rooms are not occupied mainly by the elderly, but by younger people. Specifically, those born over the age of 80, according to the perceptions of doctors.
The main cause is the medicalization of society. Furthermore, one of the biggest reasons for consultation is mental health. It should be remembered that Spain has the record in the consumption of benzodiazepines worldwide. “We have gone from addressing chronicity to consulting a population that wants to medicalize any aspect of its life,” says the SEMG spokesperson. “Before, young people came for a consultation for tonsillitis or a sprain, but now they come for many more things,” he adds.
2025 goals
General and family doctors they complain to the health authorities an adequate provision of human and material resources, budgetary commitment, promotion of research and attention focused on continuity.
One of its goals for 2025 is to lhe creation of a basic research network in Care Primary. It will be done with the help of promoters, scientific societies and organizations, according to the SEMG.
“Research must be recognized in outpatient clinics and to do so, The first thing is to transfer it to the work agenda of health professionalss”, says the president of the society. In addition, Dr. Armenteros del Olmo adds that the self-management of appointments by doctors and the reduction of administrative work would allow them to have time to carry out this task.
It is worth mentioning that last Tuesday, the Council of Ministers gave the green light to the Pharmaceutical Strategy. This roadmap includes as a measure the promotion of clinical trials in outpatient clinics, as stated in the document.
Spain is a country with a great life expectancy. Another goal for 2025 is to update the RENACE project (National Registry of Centenarians). A few years ago, the company carried out a pilot study and registered 75 people at least 100 years old. Now they want to update this information and understand in depth why these people reach this age.
In the first piloting “there were some conclusions that reflected the importance of care in the first years of life, both in diet and exercise; for healthy aging,” says Pilar Rodríguez. In the next one, a series of biomarkers focused on the genome and exome will follow.
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