Institute of General Practice and Evidence-Based Health Services Research, Medical University of Graz, Graz, Austria.
Institute of General Practice, Johann Wolfgang Goethe University Frankfurt, Frankfurt, Germany.
Front Public Health. 2022 Dec 6;10:1072515. doi: 10.3389/fpubh.2022.1072515. eCollection 2022.
General practitioners (GPs) are frequently patients' first point of contact with the healthcare system and play an important role in identifying, managing and monitoring cases. This study investigated the experiences of GPs from seven different countries in the early phases of the COVID-19 pandemic.
International cross-sectional online survey.
General practitioners from Australia, Austria, Germany, Hungary, Italy, Slovenia and Switzerland.
Overall, 1,642 GPs completed the survey.
We focused on how well-prepared GPs were, their self-confidence and concerns, efforts to control the spread of the disease, patient contacts, information flow, testing procedures and protection of staff.
GPs gave high ratings to their self-confidence (7.3, 95% CI 7.1-7.5) and their efforts to control the spread of the disease (7.2, 95% CI 7.0-7.3). A decrease in the number of patient contacts (5.7, 95% CI 5.4-5.9), the perception of risk (5.3 95% CI 4.9-5.6), the provision of information to GPs (4.9, 95% CI 4.6-5.2), their testing of suspected cases (3.7, 95% CI 3.4-3.9) and their preparedness to face a pandemic (mean: 3.5; 95% CI 3.2-3.7) were rated as moderate. GPs gave low ratings to their ability to protect staff (2.2 95% CI 1.9-2.4). Differences were identified in all dimensions except protection of staff, which was consistently low in all surveyed GPs and countries.
Although GPs in the different countries were confronted with the same pandemic, its impact on specific aspects differed. This partly reflected differences in health care systems and experience of recent pandemics. However, it also showed that the development of structured care plans in case of future infectious diseases requires the early involvement of primary care representatives.
全科医生（GP）通常是患者与医疗保健系统的第一联系点，在识别、管理和监测病例方面发挥着重要作用。本研究调查了来自七个不同国家的全科医生在 COVID-19 大流行早期的经历。
国际横断面在线调查。
来自澳大利亚、奥地利、德国、匈牙利、意大利、斯洛文尼亚和瑞士的全科医生。
共有 1642 名全科医生完成了调查。
我们重点关注全科医生的准备情况、自信心和关注点、控制疾病传播的努力、与患者的接触、信息流动、检测程序以及工作人员的保护。
全科医生对自己的信心（7.3，95%CI 7.1-7.5）和控制疾病传播的努力（7.2，95%CI 7.0-7.3）给予了高度评价。患者接触人数减少（5.7，95%CI 5.4-5.9）、风险感知（5.3 95%CI 4.9-5.6）、向全科医生提供信息（4.9，95%CI 4.6-5.2）、对疑似病例的检测（3.7，95%CI 3.4-3.9）和应对大流行的准备情况（平均：3.5；95%CI 3.2-3.7）被评为中等。全科医生保护员工的能力（2.2，95%CI 1.9-2.4）评价较低。除了所有被调查的全科医生和国家都一致认为员工保护措施较低的维度外，在所有维度都存在差异。
尽管不同国家的全科医生都面临着相同的大流行，但它对特定方面的影响有所不同。这部分反映了医疗保健系统的差异和最近大流行的经验。然而，这也表明，在未来发生传染病时，需要制定结构化的护理计划，这需要基层医疗代表的早期参与。
