Journal of primary care & community health
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J Prim Care Community Health · Jan 2021
Rural Emergency Medical Service Providers Perceptions on the Causes of and Solutions to the Opioid Crisis: A Qualitative Assessment.
The continuing opioid crisis poses unique challenges to remote and often under-resourced rural communities. Emergency medical service (EMS) providers serve a critical role in responding to opioid overdose for individuals living in rural or remote areas who experience opioid overdoses. They are often first at the scene of an overdose and are sometimes the only health care provider in contact with an overdose patient who either did not survive or refused additional care. As such, EMS providers have valuable perspectives to share on the causes and consequences of the opioid crisis in rural communities. ⋯ Along with the recognition that the opioid crisis was at least partially caused by overprescribing, rural EMS providers who participated in this study recognized the critical role of social determinants of health in perpetuating opioid-related harm. Participants in this study reported that education and increased access to treatment facilities and appropriate pain management, along with recognition of the role of social determinants of health in opioid dependency, were necessary steps to address the opioid crisis.
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J Prim Care Community Health · Jan 2021
Transforming Interprofessional Roles During Virtual Health Care: The Evolving Role of the Medical Assistant, in Relationship to National Health Profession Competency Standards.
Medical assistants (MAs) were once limited to obtaining vital signs and office work. Now, MAs are foundational to team-based care, interacting with patients, systems, and teams in many ways. The transition to Virtual Health during the COVID-19 pandemic resulted in a further rapid and unique shift of MA roles and responsibilities. We sought to understand the impact of this shift and to place their new roles in the context of national professional competency standards. ⋯ The transition to Virtual Health decreased MA's direct clinical work and expanded other roles within interprofessional care, notably quality improvement and technology support. Comparison of the current MA roles with national training program competencies identified new leadership and teamwork competencies which could be expanded during MA training to better support MA roles on inter-professional teams.
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J Prim Care Community Health · Jan 2020
Online Clinical Consultation as a Utility Tool for Managing Medical Crisis During a Pandemic: Retrospective Analysis on the Characteristics of Online Clinical Consultations During the COVID-19 Pandemic.
Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is a newly-identified infectious diseases that has rapidly spread throughout the world with rising fatalities with declaration by World Health Organization as the pandemic. Online consultations have been shown to alleviate the pandemic with our study aims to demonstrate whether online consultation can be a solution for acute health crisis. Retrospective analysis of the characteristics of online consultations through two primary care online-consultation platforms during COVID-19 pandemic was performed at the Third Affiliated Hospital of Sun Yat-Sen University, which led the assessment of COVID-19-symptoms patients in Guangzhou. ⋯ The number of online consultations has increased with diagnosis of upper respiratory tract infection, psychological conditions, COVID-19-related investigations and interventions. The increased online consultations met the increased demand of the relevant clinical services and reduced the overwhelming hospital presentations, thus decreasing the potential COVID-19 spread inside the major tertiary hospital and sparing the resources for acute crisis management. The epidemiology and disease characteristics of online consultations during the pandemic have been demonstrated with identification of the enabling factors and potential barriers in improving online healthcare in China with online consultation model being a durable solution for pandemic in future.
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J Prim Care Community Health · Jan 2020
Utilizing the Learning Health System Adaptation to guide Family Medicine Practice to COVID-19 response.
COVID-19 supportive quarantine care in the community is managed by primary care practices. There is no current guidance on how a primary care practice with high volumes of patients screened for COVID-19 can re-configure itself to become responsive to the pandemic. We examined Learning Health System guidance from the National Academies of Science, Engineering and Medicine and adapted it to our primary care practice to create an efficient, effective, adaptive response to the COVID-19 pandemic. We suggest evaluating this response in the future for effectiveness and efficiency.
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J Prim Care Community Health · Jan 2020
Addressing the COVID-19 Nutrition Crisis in Vulnerable Communities: Applying a Primary Care Perspective.
The coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic and subsequent public health interventions have disrupted food systems all over the world. In the Philippines, where stringent lockdown rules have been implemented, households living in poverty have had to rely largely on food aid in the form of food packs distributed by local governments and private donors. ⋯ The negative health impact of commonly distributed food packs on food aid-dependent households shine a light on how the COVID-19 pandemic and public health policies exacerbate health inequities. A primary care perspective is essential in creating food security policies that can effectively address acute hunger and malnutrition without contributing to the long-term deleterious effects of inadequate nutrition on the health of indigent communities.