Denis Pereira Gray made this point some years ago. It is correct, but the
problem is that it isn't compatible with modern general practice. Twenty
years ago, fewer people saw their own GP, and the volume of total contacts
was much lower. Now, the total volume of contacts is up, and something has
to give. A home visit is about the least efficient way of givng care that I
know of, since you can do 3-6 surgery appointments in the same time. They
made some kind of sense in the days when only the GP had transport, but
nowadays very few people can't get down; perhaps the very old, the
terminally ill (and to quote one of my local colleagues) the dead.
I often think of a retired friend of mine, who once went an entire year in
the fifties, working a one in two, without ever getting out of bed after ten
p.m. He makes the point that people got just as ill in those days.
Andrew
Dr. Andrew N. Herd MRCGP [log in to unmask]
Family Physician, Medical Adviser to Durham Health Authority
Lecturer in Primary Care, Durham University
Medical Editor, Practice Computing
-----Original Message-----
From: Michael Durham <[log in to unmask]>
To: [log in to unmask] <[log in to unmask]>
Date: 31 January 1998 10:45
Subject: Re: Home Visits
>Home visits nust be a good way of finding out about patients lifestyles and
>domestic arrangements - first time round, anyway. I'm not saying its any
fun
>to be called out for the nth time to some hypochondriac but I'd have
thought
>in many cases it was easier to treat a patient knowing something about what
>their home backgrounds. Or not?
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