Trial of rural practice evaluation: mutual rotation by family physicians.
OBJECTIVE
We aimed to investigate the usefulness of mutual rotation by family physicians in providing an evaluation of rural medical practices.


METHODS
Between June and October 1994, each of four family physicians rotated to the practices of the other three, where they worked as a transient locum for 4-5 days and evaluated each practice. They were field faculty physicians of the Department of Community and Family Medicine, Jichi Medical School, and based at general practices accredited for undergraduate and postgraduate training. Two school-based faculty physicians also participated in the study as spare members.


RESULTS
The rotation was conducted four times to complete the mutual rotation programme. There was some difference in evaluation among the practices, which indicated the characteristics of the practices. The evaluation accorded relatively well among the participants.


CONCLUSIONS
Mutual rotation by family physicians provides an objective and practicable evaluation of general practices and contribute to upholding their quality, which is crucial to medical education.
Inoue
K
K
Department of Community and Family Medicine, Jichi Medical School, Tochigi, Japan.
Okuno
M
M
Yamada
T
T
Turuda
K
K
Orimo
K
K
Waza
K
K
Igarashi
M
M
D005180:Faculty, Medical / Q000600:supply & distribution*; D005194:Family Practice / Q000193:education / Q000592:standards*; D006801:Humans; D018024:Peer Review, Health Care / Q000379:methods*; D010561:Personnel Staffing and Scheduling; D010821:Physicians, Family / Q000600:supply & distribution*; D010818:Practice Patterns, Physicians' / Q000592:standards*; D015203:Reproducibility of Results; D019035:Rural Health Services / Q000592:standards*