The results of a study to identify criteria that could help select applicants to medical school who have a lasting commitment to family medicine are presented. During the past 15 years major efforts have been made to increase the number of family physicians in the United States. Although primary care programs attract more students whose initial…

Prepaid group practice as a concept for providing health care is now over 25 years old in the nation and in New York City. It has overcome initial opposition by the medical profession and has been adopted by government as a healthy strategy under the acronym HMO or "Health Maintenance Organization". The author asserts that on two major…

Medical academic centers must adjust to a period of little or no real economic growth and make changes for continuing progress. Areas affected by the economic slowdown include policies regarding faculty private practice, the relationship between teaching hospitals and academic health centers, the production of primary care physicians, and the…

Discusses the effects of trends in health care services, including an emphasis on primary health care and patient involvement, on the information needs of health care professionals and managers. A proposed information network that would provide point of use access to sources of health care information is described. (three references) (CLB)

This paper describes a systematic, coordinated approach to the delivery of health and social services to the rural elderly of Maine provided by the Kennebec Valley Regional Health Agency. Four points of the model are described which distinguish it from other models of coordination: (1) a strong medical orientation in the assessment process; (2)…

Personality and a social support system are two factors that may influence women medical students' choice of a rural primary care specialty. The 2-year study of 11 University of New Mexico School of Medicine women students engaged in 4-month rural primary care preceptorships included interviews and a personality inventory. Three women had…

Relationships among variables that may predict medical school graduates who will be licensed, will practice primary care medicine, and will select Ohio and southwestern Ohio as the location of their practice were evaluated with the 1980 initial graduating class of the Wright State University School of Medicine, Ohio. The following statistical…

Trainees in the Consortium Training Program included residents in psychiatry, pediatrics, and internal medicine; medical students; interns in psychology; and graduate students in social work and nursing. Training involved supervised direct patient contacts in an interdisciplinary setting and weekly half-day seminars (consisting of 90-minute…

The objectives of this preliminary study were to evaluate the feasibility and acceptability of using trained simulated patient instructors (N=6) as an office-based continuing medical education method and to assess the current sexually transmitted diseases/human immunodeficiency virus risk assessment and counseling practices of primary care…

Pediatricians can play a role in promoting family literacy. Boston City Hospital has developed a model program that integrates family literacy into pediatric primary care, and has designed a program of research to evaluate its effects. The program has three components. In the waiting room, volunteers model for parents how to listen, question,…

Some of the principal research advances of the 1970s related to pregnancy and newborn infants and consequent changes in obstetrical practice are summarized in this report. The process of infant-parent attachment (bonding), adolescent pregnancy, and the reproductive hazards of tobacco, alcohol, and poor nutrition have been investigated and, in…

This paper describes the impact of early clinical contact (ECC) on medical students. The concepts emerged from a grounded theory analysis of interviews with students and faculty in the ECC program at Ohio University College of Osteopathic Medicine, which places first-year and second-year students in a variety of clinical settings in ambulatory…

This paper explores the broad definition of health in the rural context and relates it to policy, practice, and pedagogical challenges in providing access to services in rural areas. Historically, policy, practice, and teaching institutions have supported a dependency model for health service delivery, forcing rural communities to rely on…

Recognizing the needs, deficiencies, and diversity of school health services is prerequisite to any analysis of need. More uniform programs and more equitable access for all school children to whatever minimal standard of health services should be provided: periodic examination, some limited medical care on the school grounds, intensive health…

A questionnaire was administered to 339 graduating senior medical students at the Medical College of Georgia to determine different potential sources of influence on career choice. Indebtedness may be associated with the choice of a non-primary care specialty with greater remuneration than primary care specialty. (MLW)