[Accesibility and use of spirometry in primary care centers in Catalonia]

Examine the accessibility and use of forced spirometry (FS) in public primary care facilities centers in Catalonia.

Cross-sectional study using a survey.

Three hundred sixty-six Primary Care Teams (PCT) in Catalonia. Third quarter of 2010.

Survey with information on spirometers, training, interpretation and quality control, and the priority that the quality of spirometry had for the team. Indicators FS/100 inhabitants/year, FS/month/PCT; FS/month/10,000 inhabitants.

Response rate: 75%. 97.5% of PCT had spirometer and made an average of 2.01 spirometries/100 inhabitants (34.68 spirometry/PCT/month). 83% have trained professionals.>50% centers perform formal training but no information is available on the quality. 70% performed some sort of calibration. Interpretation was made by the family physician in 87.3% of cases. In 68% of cases not performed any quality control of exploration. 2/3 typed data manually into the computerized medical record.>50% recognized a high priority strategies for improving the quality.

Despite the accessibility of EF efforts should be made to standardize training, increasing the number of scans test and promote systematic quality control.