International primary care snapshot: academic primary care in Italy

AN ITALIAN DILEMMA

Family medicine (also known as general practice or primary health care) has undergone substantial growth accompanied by academic development in Western countries during recent years. In Europe, however, the situation is not uniform: although in Northern European countries family medicine is established in both the national health system (NHS) and the universities, and academic general practice looks promising in post-Communist Eastern European countries, in Southern European counterparts it is still considered a minor medical discipline. Even within Southern Europe the pattern of family medicine is not homogeneous, because several countries such as Croatia, Portugal, and Greece do include some academic curricula in family medicine. Yet this is not the case in Italy, where general practice is completely devoid of any academic features.

In fact, Italian universities have no primary care departments at all, and general practice is not even included in the undergraduate curriculum of Italian medical schools. Only private foundations conduct primary care research in Italy.

Italian GPs do not have the opportunity to pursue a PhD programme in family medicine, nor …