General medicine in the 'eighties.

Area of Science:

• Internal Medicine
• Acute Care Medicine
• Medical Education

Background:

• General physicians provide primary responsibility for acute medical care.
• Specialty interests often support, but are subordinate to, general medicine.
• District general hospital consultants manage higher acute medicine caseloads than teaching hospital colleagues.

Purpose of the Study:

• To define the scope and importance of the general physician's role in acute care.
• To examine the impact of caseload on training in acute medicine.
• To project the future necessity of general physicians in hospital services.

Main Methods:

• Review of the responsibilities of general physicians in acute and intensive care.
• Analysis of the implications of consultant caseloads on medical training.
• Assessment of the long-term role of general physicians within the hospital system.

Main Results:

• General physicians are central to initial and ongoing acute medical care.
• Intensive care unit patient management is primarily a general physician's task.
• Higher acute medicine caseloads in district general hospitals affect training.

Conclusions:

• The general physician is indispensable for acute medicine and intensive care.
• The role of the general physician is vital for both current and future hospital services.
• Training in acute medicine must consider the workload of consultants in district general hospitals.