General and family medicine: a gratifying choice.

Abstract

The problematic discussion of speciality choice have been largely studied in other countries, where we can see the same setting of the announced crises of Primary Care and the so called decline of Family Medicine. In Portugal, many authors have shown an increasing concern in the way of getting more attention by the political policies/entities for the reduction of the number of family doctors. The decline of the interest of the medical students for Family Medicine is a complex and multifactorial problem that exists at international level, as in other generalist specialities, without technical procedures and technological investment. The importance of human values in medical education, by the new challenges that we have in the XXI century medicine, puts us the question about the students we are graduating today in our schools. The educational and health system reform, and the medical schools support, may influence the choices of medical graduates and motivate them for this speciality, developing a more real and more close medical care that responds to the interests and the needs of the population.