title: Capacity evaluation for general practitioners in Pudong new area of Shanghai: an empirical study.
abstract: Building highly qualified General Practitioners (GPs) is key to the development of primary health care. It's therefore urgent to ensure the GPs' quality service under the background of the new round of health care system reforms in China. A new model of GP qualification examination was originally implemented in Pudong New Area of Shanghai, China, which aimed to empirically evaluate the GPs' capability in terms of clinical performance and social recognition. In the current study, an analysis was made of the first two years (2014-2015) of such theoretical and practical examinations on the GPs there with a view to getting a deep insight into the GP community so as to identify the barriers to such a form of GP qualification examination.
  
  
  
  The agency survey method was applied to the two-year database of the GP examinees, the formative research conducted to explore the key elements for developing the examination model. The data analysis was performed with SPSS for Windows (Version 19.0) to describe the GPs' overall characteristics, and to make comparisons between different groups.
  
  
  
  In 2015, the total number of GPs was 1264 in the area, in different districts of which, statistically significant differences were found in sex, age, professional title and employment span (P < 0.05). Such results were found to be similar to those in 2014. The examinees' theoretical scores were statistically different (F = 7.76; P < 0.05), showing a sloping trend from the urban district to the suburban, to the rural and then to the farther rural, as indicated by LSD-t test (P < 0.05). From the theoretical examinations the scores were higher on the western medicine than on the traditional Chinese medicine (F = 22.11; P < 0.05).
  
  
  
  As suggested by the current study on the GPs' qualification examination, which was pioneered in Pudong New Area of Shanghai, the construction of GP community was far from sufficient. It was a preliminary study and further studies are merited along the construction and development in terms of continuing medical education, performance appraisal and incentive mechanism.
authors.affiliation: Shanghai Pudong Institute for Health Development, Shanghai, China.|Pudong New Area Commission of Health and Family Planning, Shanghai, China.
authors.forename: Ming
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Li
authors.affiliation: Shanghai Pudong Institute for Health Development, Shanghai, China.
authors.forename: Zhiqun
authors.initials: Z
authors.lastname: Shu
authors.affiliation: Shanghai Pudong Institute for Health Development, Shanghai, China.|Pudong New Area Commission of Health and Family Planning, Shanghai, China.
authors.forename: Xuan
authors.initials: X
authors.lastname: Huang
authors.affiliation: Medical Institutions Administration Center of Pudong New Area, Shanghai, China.
authors.forename: Zhaohui
authors.initials: Z
authors.lastname: Du
authors.affiliation: Pudong New Area Commission of Health and Family Planning, Shanghai, China.
authors.forename: Jun
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Wu
authors.affiliation: Medical Institutions Administration Center of Pudong New Area, Shanghai, China.
authors.forename: Qingshi
authors.initials: Q
authors.lastname: Xia
authors.affiliation: Shanghai Pudong Institute for Health Development, Shanghai, China.
authors.forename: Kun
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Liu
authors.affiliation: Shanghai Pudong Institute for Health Development, Shanghai, China.
authors.forename: Jiquan
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Lou
authors.affiliation: Shanghai Pudong Institute for Health Development, Shanghai, China. lmjing@live.cn.
authors.forename: Limei
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Jing
mesh_terms: D017677:Age Distribution; D057191:Capacity Building / Q000458:organization & administration*; D002681:China; D005260:Female; D058005:General Practitioners / Q000592:standards* / Q000600:supply & distribution*; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D011320:Primary Health Care / Q000592:standards* / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D012111:Residence Characteristics; D017678:Sex Distribution
keywords: Capacity Evaluation; Empirical Study; Formative Evaluation; General Practitioner; Health Service; Human Resource; Preliminary Study; Primary Health Care; Shanghai