HWN Suggests

I Am the Problem with Family Medicine

I frequently hear from colleagues that our health system is broken and that primary care is the only way to fix it. We (primary care providers) possess broad-spectrum training to prevent and treat illness; the idea seems to be that given the right number of family doctors, we could solve this country’s health issues.

I believe in the future of Family Medicine, but our specialty has a problem: Me. I am a family doctor who no longer practices full-spectrum care. My medical journey has taught me that individual circumstances shape physician practice. In the future, individual practices will prohibit an increase in family doctors and limit the “breadth” of services required to…

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Articles of Interest

Family doctors are the key to improving primary health care in communities

Countries that have well developed primary health care systems are known to have better health outcomes, fewer people in hospital, increased patient satisfaction and lower costs.

The Family Physician of the Future

We must recognize that times have changed. Our tremendous successes in handling issues such as infectious disease pale with our difficulty in managing chronic pain, depression, obesity, and other epidemics of modern life. Sadly, our healthcare system is not about health.

CrossFit is amassing an army of doctors trying to disrupt health care

After 12 years of practicing family medicine in Wellesley, Massachusetts, Ronda Rockett was losing faith in her ability to help the majority of her patients. Patient after patient would stream into her clinic with diabetes, weight problems, and heart disease. Rockett followed the medical guidelines, recommending healthier diets and more exercise. But despite her best efforts — even texting and emailing motivational follow-ups — many failed to change at all, either because they didn’t want to or didn’t have the means. In 2013, eager to try something new, Rockett decided to quit medicine and close up her practice. What she did next, she says, is the most meaningful contribution to health care she’s made to date. She opened a CrossFit gym.

Most teens still visit pediatricians—but they deserve doctors trained to treat them

An adolescent health specialist explains what it means to understand teens.

Point/Counterpoint: Will Choosing Wisely improve quality of care?

Can Choosing Wisely improve quality of care? It already is. Systems are beginning to embed conversations on overuse—the aspiration of the campaign—into their cultures through electronic health records (EHR) and other constructs.

The Disappearing Doctor: How Mega-Mergers Are Changing the Business of Medical Care

Is the doctor in? In this new medical age of urgent care centers and retail clinics, that’s not a simple question. Nor does it have a simple answer, as primary care doctors become increasingly scarce.

With Direct Primary Care, It’s Just Doctor and Patient

Patients pay a monthly fee for a range of basic services, eliminating the insurance middleman.

Resources

Family Physicians Inquiries Network

We are so pleased to welcome you to the Family Physicians Inquiries Network (FPIN) Consortium. The FPIN Consortium has developed over the past ten years in response to a need to make evidence-based family medicine and clinical scholarship more accessible to family physicians in clinical practice.

Family Practice Notebook

FPnotebook’s one goal is to help you and I make the best decision possible for the patient in front of us. Quick answers to tough questions at the point of care. Over 5900 interlinked topic pages divided into 2200 sections in 700 chapters of 31 books. See the Site Map to visualize the breadth of coverage.

GPnotebook

GPnotebook is an online encyclopaedia of medicine that provides a trusted immediate reference resource for clinicians in the UK and internationally. Updated continually, our database consists of over 26,000 pages of information.

MDedge Family Medicine

keeping you informed. Saving you time.

Pulse

Pulse is the UK's leading medical weekly publication, counting more than 70% of GPs among our regular readers, and as a result our website pulsetoday.co.uk is a must-visit web destination for GPs and other primary care professionals.

ThinkGP

ThinkGP is the leading provider of online education solutions to GPs and other health care providers.

WONCA

Global Family Doctor...WONCA is an unusual, yet convenient acronym comprising the first five initials of the World Organization of National Colleges, Academies and Academic Associations of General Practitioners/Family Physicians. WONCA's short name is World Organization of Family Doctors. The Mission of WONCA is to improve the quality of life of the peoples of the world through defining and promoting its values, including respect for universal human rights and including gender equity, and by fostering high standards of care in general practice/family medicine.

Choosing Wisely

How can physicians and patients have the important conversations necessary to ensure the right care is delivered at the right time? Choosing Wisely® aims to answer that question. An initiative of the ABIM Foundation, Choosing Wisely is focused on encouraging physicians, patients and other health care stakeholders to think and talk about medical tests and procedures that may be unnecessary, and in some instances can cause harm.

Cochrane

Cochrane is for anyone interested in using high-quality information to make health decisions. Whether you are a doctor or nurse, patient or carer, researcher or funder, Cochrane evidence provides a powerful tool to enhance your healthcare knowledge and decision making.

DoctorsLounge

The Monthly Journal Summary is a single article covering the most important journal articles published in the previous 30 days.

MDLinx

MDLinx Family Medicine stands out from other primary care literature review services because of our dedication to keeping our members current in less time. On a daily basis, receive an email with just the 'headlines' covering everything important that published in your specialty in the past 24 hours.

MedPage Today

MedPage Today is the only service for physicians that provides a clinical perspective on the breaking medical news in primary care that their patients are reading.