Current status of health services research in primary care in Korea

ABSTRACT

Primary care is a key component of a health care system and many countries have been making efforts to strengthen their primary care. We aimed to outline the status of health service research on primary care in Korea. In Medline and nine Korean databases, we searched the original articles published in peer-reviewed journals through December 2015, and summarized and classified the articles. Their publication year, journal name, research methods and research topics were presented. The main categories of research topics were health care delivery, utilization, quality, workforce, resources, financing, and others. The total number of research papers was 297, and these were mainly published in domestic Korean journals (92.6%). The most frequently adopted research methods were quantitative ones, and various types of data were used. The most two common topics were health care delivery and quality of care. Diversity of data sources, lack of public research funding and low participation of primary care physicians were also found. A clarification of the scope of health services research and refinement of topic classification will be beneficial. In short, this study provides a basis for building a primary care health services research database and can be used as a data source for subsequent research. It is also necessary to set research priorities for the development and evaluation of primary care policy.