[Minor surgery in the family physician's office. Description of one year's experience].

OBJECTIVE

To describe the first results from minor surgery (MS) performed by the family doctor (FD) and to analyse the concordance between presurgical diagnosis and anatomical pathology.

DESIGN

Prospective study.

SETTING

Health centre and hospital anatomical pathology service.

PARTICIPANTS

Interventions over a year by 4 FD and 8 third-year family medicine interns.

MEASUREMENTS AND MAIN RESULTS

Descriptive variables for all the interventions were analysed. There were: age and gender; place, size and diagnosis of the lesion; reason for the MS; type of intervention; waiting time; and histological findings. The prior diagnosis was compared with the anatomical pathology for simple agreement. There were 243 interventions. Complete data were obtained for 229 (124 female and 105 male, aged between 4 and 79). The most common reason for MS was aesthetic, followed by fear of malignity and pain. The techniques used most often were: surgical exeresis (56.3%) and cryotherapy (36.2%). Most problems treated were naevi (72 cases), verrucas (83) and epidemic-sebaceous cysts (23). All the substances extracted (140) were sent to Pathology and there was 84.1% agreement between the Laboratory report and doctor's diagnosis. Average waiting time for the intervention was 15 days.

CONCLUSIONS

Performing MS in primary care is feasible, as long as the FD is correctly trained. In our unit there is little waiting time and high histopathologic concordance.