Medical deserts in Spain-Insights from an international project.

INTRODUCTION: Medical deserts are a growing phenomenon across many European countries. They are usually defined as (i) rural areas, (ii) underserved areas or (iii) by applying a measure of distance/time to a facility or a combination of the three characteristics. The objective was to define medical deserts in Spain as well as map their driving factors and approaches to mitigate them. METHODS: A mixed methods approach was applied following the project "A Roadmap out of medical deserts into supportive health workforce initiatives and policies" work plan. It included the following elements: (i) a scoping literature review; (ii) a questionnaire survey; (iii) national stakeholders' workshop; (iv) a descriptive case study on medical deserts in Spain. RESULTS: Medical deserts in Spain exist in the form of mostly rural areas with limited access to health care. The main challenge in their identification and monitoring is local data availability. Diversity of both factors contributing to medical deserts and solutions applied to eliminate or mitigate them can be identified in Spain. They can be related to demand for or supply of health care services. More national data, analyses and/or initiatives seem to be focused on the health care supply dimension. CONCLUSIONS: Addressing medical deserts in Spain requires a comprehensive and multidimensional approach. Effective policies are needed to address both the medical staff education and planning system, working conditions, as well as more intersectoral approach to the population health management.

Healthcare pathways and resource use: mapping consequences of ambulance assessment for direct care with alternative healthcare providers.

BACKGROUND: A decision system in the ambulance allowing alternative pathways to alternate healthcare providers has been developed for older patients in Stockholm, Sweden. However, subsequent healthcare resource use resulting from these pathways has not yet been addressed. The aim of this study was therefore to describe patient pathways, healthcare utilisation and costs following ambulance transportation to alternative healthcare providers. METHODS: The design of this study was descriptive and observational. Data from a previous RCT, where a decision system in the ambulance enabled alternative healthcare pathways to alternate healthcare providers were linked to register data. The receiving providers were: primary acute care centre or secondary geriatric ward, both located at the same community hospital, or the conventional pathway to the emergency department at an acute hospital. Resource use over 10 days, subsequent to assessment with the decision system, was mapped in terms of healthcare pathways, utilisation and costs for the 98 included cases. RESULTS: Almost 90% were transported to the acute care centre or geriatric ward. The vast majority arriving to the geriatric ward stayed there until the end of follow-up or until discharged, whereas patients conveyed to the acute care centre to a large extent were admitted to hospital. The median patient had 6 hospital days, 2 outpatient visits and costed roughly 4000 euros over the 10-day period. Arrival destination geriatric ward indicated the longest hospital stay and the emergency department the shortest. However, the cost for the 10-day period was lower for cases arriving to the geriatric ward than for those arriving to the emergency department. CONCLUSIONS: The findings support the appropriateness of admittance directly to secondary geriatric care for older adults. However, patients conveyed to the acute care centre ought to be studied in more detail with regards to appropriate level of care.

Prehospital emergency care nurses' strategies while caring for patients with limited Swedish-English proficiency.

AIMS AND OBJECTIVES: To explore the strategies of nurses working in the ambulance service while caring for patients with limited Swedish-English proficiency. BACKGROUND: Communication difficulties due to lack of mutual language is a challenge in healthcare systems around the world. Little is known about nurses' strategies while caring for patients with whom they do not share a mutual language in an unstructured, unplanned prehospital emergency environment, the ambulance service. DESIGN AND METHOD: A qualitative study design based on interviews was used, and a purposeful sample and snowball technique were used to identify nurses with prehospital emergency experience of caring for patients with limited Swedish-English proficiency. RESULTS: Eleven nurses were interviewed, and the main strategy they used was adapting to the patients' need and the caring situation. The nurses used their own body, and tone of voice for creating a sense of trust and security. The nurses also used structured assessment in accordance with medical guidelines. Translation devices and relatives/bystanders were used as interpreters when possible. Another strategy was to transport the patient directly to the emergency department as they had not found a secure way of assessing and caring for the patients in the ambulance. CONCLUSION: The nurses used a palette of strategies while assessing and caring for patients when there was no mutual language between the caregiver and care seeker. RELEVANCE TO CLINICAL PRACTICE: The nurses need to be prepared for how to assess and care for patients when there is a lack of mutual language; otherwise, there is a risk of increased unequal care in the ambulance service. To further explore and learn about this field of research, studies exploring the patients' perspective are needed.

Patients with head trauma: A study on initial prehospital assessment and care.

BACKGROUND: Best evidence guidelines are intended to standardise assessment and treatment of patients with head trauma and improve outcomes for TBI patients. The primary aim was to explore pre-hospital emergency care nurses' (PECNs') documented assessment and care of patients with head trauma and the secondary aim to study gender differences in the documented care and interventions given by the PECNs. METHODS: A retrospective observational study was conducted by evaluating 2750 prehospital medical records. RESULTS: The results showed that 25.2% of the patients were assessed according to all four core-elements in the guidelines and 78.6% of the patients underwent at least one intervention by the PECNs. Male patients were to a higher extent assessed according to guidelines and were given higher transport priority while females were more often assessed for vital parameters and received significantly more analgesics. The assessment documented by the PECNs was not optimal concerning documentation using the Glasgow Coma Scale, but the documented assessment of circulation and, especially, respiratory rate was high (77.2%) compared to previous studies. CONCLUSION: The findings of this study showed a low degree of documented assessment of parameters related to head trauma and might also indicate some gender differences in the assessment and management.

[Family and community medicine and the university. SESPAS report 2010]. / La medicina familiar y comunitaria y la universidad. Informe SESPAS 2012.

Family and community medicine is an academic subject, a medical specialty and a health profession with distinct dimensions: healthcare, teaching, research and management. In this discipline, the object of knowledge is the person, understood as a whole. Family medicine, as an academic subject, and primary care, as a health education setting, should be incorporated into the core graduate and postgraduate curricula. The absence of these elements leads to training bias and has major repercussions on quality, coordination and patient safety. The development of the Health Professions Act and the construction of the European Higher Education Area (EHEA) have created a favorable climate for the presence of this discipline in the university. Since the 1960s, family medicine has been consolidated as an academic subject with its own departments in almost all European universities, and a significant number of family physicians are teachers. A balance has been achieved between the hospital-based system (based on theory, disease, and the biological model) and the patient-centred model (based on problem solving, community-oriented and the bio-psycho-social model). The introduction of family and community medicine as a specific subject, and as a transverse subject and as an option in practicals, represents the adaptation of the educational system to social needs. This adaptation also represents a convergence with other European countries and the various legal requirements protecting this convergence. However, this new situation requires a new structure (departments) and faculty (professors and associate and assistant professors).