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Biomedical subjects

Janice Charles

Publications and source records attributed to Janice Charles.

29 records · Page 2Linked to original sources
PubMed2005

Presentations of headache in Australian general practice.

The BEACH program, a continuous national study of general practice activity in Australia, gives us an overview of the consultations in general practice involving a patient presentation of "headache". Patient reasons for encounter specified as migraine, cluster, vascular or tension headaches were not included in the analysis. This provides a backdrop against which articles in this issue of Australian Family Physician can be further considered.

Adolescent↗
PubMed2005

Management of growth delay in patients aged less than 6 years.

The BEACH program, a continuous national study of general practice activity in Australia, gives us an overview of consultations in general practice involving the management of growth delay. "Growth delay" encompasses physical problems such as "failure to thrive" and "delayed physical development" in infants and children. Over 80% of encounters at which growth delay was managed were with patients aged less than 6 years, so we have concentrated our analysis on this early childhood group. This provides a backdrop against which articles in this issue of Australian Family Physician can be further considered.

Adult↗
PubMed2005

Encounters with indigenous patients in Australian general practice.

The BEACH program, a continuous national study of general practice activity in Australia, gives an overview of consultations with indigenous patients. Between 1998 and 2003, general practitioners recorded 5476 consultations with people who identified themselves as being of Aboriginal and/or Torres Strait Islander origin. These accounted for approximately 1% of total BEACH encounters for the 5 year period. In this article we compare 'indigenous encounters' with total BEACH encounters. This provides a backdrop against which articles in this issue of Australian Family Physician can be further considered.

Australia↗
PubMed2005

Management of renal problems in Australian general practice.

The BEACH program, a continuous national study of general practice activity in Australia, gives us an overview of consultations involving the management of renal problems. In this analysis, we have included renal failure, glomerulonephritis/nephrosis (all forms of nephritis and nephrotic syndrome), renal insufficiency, nephropathy (including diabetic and analgesic), and uraemia and nephrosclerosis grouped as 'other'. This synopsis provides a backdrop against which articles in this issue of Australian Family Physician can be further considered.

Adult↗
PubMed2005

Management of epilepsy in general practice patients.

The BEACH program, a continuous national study of general practice activity in Australia, gives us an overview of consultations in general practice involving the management of epilepsy. Participating general practitioners recorded the problem as 'epilepsy' in 90% of cases, while 'grand mal' was specified at about 4% of encounters and 'temporal lobe' and 'petit mal' were each specified at about 1% of encounters.

Adolescent↗
PubMed2004

The evolution of the general practice workforce in Australia, 1991-2003.

OBJECTIVE: To examine changes between 1991 and 2003 in the characteristics of active recognised general practitioners in Australia. DESIGN: We compared self-reported GP characteristics from the 1990-91 Australian Morbidity and Treatment Survey (AMTS) with those from the 1999 and 2003 Bettering the Evaluation and Care of Health (BEACH) surveys, after standardisation for age and sex to the respective sample frames. AMTS and BEACH are cross-sectional, paper-based, national surveys. PARTICIPANTS: Three random samples of 473 (1990-91), 980 (1998-99) and 1008 (2002-03) GPs who had claimed at least 1500 A1 (ie, general practice) Medicare items in the preceding year (in the AMTS) or 375 general practice Medicare items in the preceding 3 months (in the BEACH surveys). MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES: Changes in distribution of GP sex, GP age, number of sessions per week, practice size and location, country of graduation, and postgraduate training. RESULTS: Between 1991 and 2003, the proportion of female GPs rose from 19.3% to 35.2%; GPs aged < 35 years dropped from 22.3% to 10.0%, and those aged >or= 55 years increased from 21.4% to 31.6%. Between 1999 and 2003, the proportion of male GPs working < 6 sessions/week increased from 6.1% to 11.4%, while the proportion working >or= 11 sessions/week fell from 23.8% to 17.1%. Between 1991 and 2003, the proportion of solo practitioners nearly halved (25.5% v 13.7%); the proportion of GPs in practices of >or= 4 partners increased from 34.3% to 59.8%; the proportion of Australian graduates fell from 81.4% to 72.2%; and the proportion of graduates from Asia and Africa increased. Over the same period, the proportion of GPs with Fellowship of the Royal Australian College of General Practitioners more than doubled (17.8% v 36.4%). All of these differences were statistically significant (P < 0.001). CONCLUSION: Changes in characteristics of the practising GP population will affect consultative services and the balance between supply and demand for these services. These changes should be considered in future workforce planning.

Adult↗
PubMed2004

Trends in childhood illness and treatment in Australian general practice, 1971-2001.

OBJECTIVE: To determine changes in morbidity and management of disease in children in Australian general practice. DESIGN AND SETTING: A comparative study of general practice consultations in children under 15 years, using data from cross-sectional general practice surveys (1990-91 and 2000-01), and a descriptive comparison with a similar study from 1971. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES: Relative rates of management (rate/100 general practice encounters) of the most common children's problems and treatments. RESULTS: Problems with significantly higher management rates in 2000-01 compared with 1990-91 included vaccination (11.1 v 7.6 per 100 encounters in 1990-91) and contact/allergic dermatitis (3.1 v 2.5). Those managed significantly less often in 2000-01 v 1990-91 included acute otitis media (7.7 v 9.4), asthma (5.4 v 8.8), tonsillitis (4.4 v 6.0), acute bronchitis (3.8 v 5.3) and gastroenteritis (1.7 v 2.7). Asthma management rates rose from 2.4% of all problems managed in 1971 to 7.2% in 1990-91, then fell in 2000-01 to 4.6%. More frequent rates of counselling and advice in 2000-01 (28.4% of encounters v 22.9% in 1990-91) were associated with a decrease in rates of prescribing and supply of medication (56.6% of encounters v 64.3% in 1990-91). Antibiotic prescribing declined significantly (from 33.8 per 100 encounters in 1990-91 to 25.2 in 2000-01), as did prescribing of respiratory medications (from 15.5 to 9.9 per 100 encounters), while prescribing of vaccines and systemic corticosteroids doubled (from 9.6 to 18.8 per 100 encounters, and from 0.6 to 1.2, respectively). (All comparisons between 1990-91 and 2000-01 are significant at P < 0.01.) CONCLUSIONS: These findings point to the emergence of a generation of Australian children who are generally well vaccinated and are less likely to present to GPs with "traditional" childhood illnesses.

Adolescent↗
PubMed2004

Current status of hormone therapy in general practice in Australia.

The BEACH program is a continuous national study of general practice activity in Australia. The subject of this analysis was all problems for which a hormone therapy years (HT) medication was prescribed or supplied at HT encounters with women aged 40 and over between March 2002 and April 2004. This provides a backdrop against which the theme articles in this issue of Australian Family Physician can be further considered.

Adult↗
PubMedDate not supplied

GP visits by health care card holders. A secondary analysis of data from Bettering the Evaluation and Care of Health (BEACH), a national study of general practice activity in Australia.

BACKGROUND: Patients of low socioeconomic status are more likely to hold a commonwealth government health care card. Card holders are recipients of age, disability, unemployment or other low income pensions. OBJECTIVE: To compare the general practice managed morbidity of health care card holders with noncard holders. METHOD: Data from one year of the continuous Australian national survey of general practice activity (comprising 98,000 encounters from 980 general practitioners) were used to compare patient and encounter characteristics and the problems managed for health care card holders and noncard holders. Logistic regression adjusted for patient confounders (age and sex, practice size, comorbidity and measured social factors) to describe morbidity associated with health care card status. RESULTS: Health care card holders were more likely to have respiratory, circulatory, musculoskeletal, psychological, neurological, endocrine, digestive, urinary and social problems managed. They were more likely to have chronic and psychosocial problems managed and to receive prescriptions. Female card holders were less likely to have a genital check up (including Pap smear). CONCLUSION: This analysis supports a relationship between socioeconomic status and health. Those from a low socioeconomic status (health care card holders) experience worse psychosocial health and more chronic health problems, have more medications prescribed and receive less preventive care.

Australia↗
PubMedDate not supplied

EPC encounters in Australian general practice.

The BEACH program, a continuous national study of general practice activity in Australia, gives us an overview of the content of Enhanced Primary Care (EPC) encounters in Australian general practice. The EPC program was introduced on 1 November 1999, and contained three major aspects of care--health assessments, care plans and case conferences.

Adolescent↗