Preventive care in Canterbury general practice.
OBJECTIVE
To describe the preventive care attitudes, beliefs, priorities and systems of Canterbury general practitioners, to compare their beliefs about appropriate care with evidence-based guidelines and to investigate possible associations between preventive care beliefs and attitudes, and selected practitioner variables.


METHODS
A questionnaire was mailed to all 375 general practitioners in Canterbury, with a response rate of 70%.


RESULTS
Respondents expressed positive attitudes to preventive care, their views about appropriate care corresponding well to United States Preventive Services Task Force recommendations. The responses of practitioners who had qualified more recently were closer to the recommendations, with these practitioners more likely to want to carry out more preventive care. Membership of an independent practice association or the Royal New Zealand College of General Practitioners was associated with more positive attitudes to preventive care and with believing more interventions to be appropriate. Relatively few preventive interventions appeared to be offered to patients in a systematic way.


CONCLUSIONS
Canterbury general practitioners were well-informed about, and interested in carrying out, more preventive care. Preventive care delivery could be enhanced in many practices by the adoption of a more systematic approach.
Williams
D
D
Crown Public Health, Christchurch.
Barnett
P
P
Toop
L
L
D001291:Attitude of Health Personnel; D019317:Evidence-Based Medicine; D005194:Family Practice / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D005260:Female; D007722:Health Knowledge, Attitudes, Practice; D006291:Health Policy; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D009520:New Zealand; D017410:Practice Guidelines as Topic; D010818:Practice Patterns, Physicians' / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D011322:Primary Prevention; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires