title: Physician reaction to a local community cholesterol screening program.
abstract: One of the primary concerns of the National Cholesterol Education Program about mass screening for elevated blood cholesterol has been the readiness of primary care physicians to deal with a large number of referrals. After 11,680 people were screened in a city of 85,000 people, 3069 (26.3%) were referred to their private physicians. Three months later a questionnaire was mailed to 76 local primary care physicians, and a follow-up letter was mailed to those who had not responded after 2 months. The response rate was 76% from a total of seven specialties, primarily internal medicine and family medicine. Seventy-nine percent of the physicians had been aware of the program, 40% diagnosed at least one case of hypercholesterolemia as a result of the program, and 71% approved of community cholesterol screening. Only one physician indicated that he was overwhelmed with referrals. We conclude that most primary-care physicians support community cholesterol screening as a public health measure and will use screening data to initiate diagnosis.
authors.affiliation: Department of Preventive Medicine, Medical College of Wisconsin, Milwaukee.
authors.forename: W G
authors.initials: WG
authors.lastname: Buchta
authors.forename: R A
authors.initials: RA
authors.lastname: Wissell
authors.forename: R C
authors.initials: RC
authors.lastname: Bagley
authors.forename: W W
authors.initials: WW
authors.lastname: Greaves
mesh_terms: D001290:Attitude; D002784:Cholesterol / Q000097:blood; D003153:Community Health Services; D006801:Humans; D006937:Hypercholesterolemia / Q000175:diagnosis / Q000517:prevention & control*; D008403:Mass Screening / Q000523:psychology; D010821:Physicians, Family / Q000523:psychology*; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires
chemical_list: D002784:Cholesterol