Health
U.S. sees care as primary importance
NEWS IN BRIEF — Posted Sept. 13, 2004
Americans made an estimated 890 million visits to physicians in 2002, and about six out of every 10 of those visits, or 560 million, were to primary care doctors, according to a new Centers for Disease Control and Prevention study.
About 20% of all visits were to surgical specialists such as orthopedic surgeons and urologists, and about 17% were to medical specialists, such as allergists and dermatologists.
Primary care physicians, who can be general practice physicians, family physicians, internists, pediatricians, obstetricians or gynecologists, preformed nine out of every 10 preventive care visits, which were likely to include diagnostic and screening services, said the study.
About 20% of primary care doctors made one or more home visits during a typical week of practice, compared with about 6% of medical and surgical specialists.
The study also found that the most frequent patient diagnoses in 2002 were for hypertension, the common cold, sore throat, diabetes and arthritis and joint disorders.
Drugs were prescribed at about two-thirds of visits totaling 1.3 billion drugs in 2002, a 25% increase in the utilization of medications over the past decade.
Note: This item originally appeared at http://www.ama-assn.org/amednews/2004/09/13/hlbf0913.htm.
