EGPRN at work in Vienna

At the 18th WONCA Europe Conference in Vienna Austria , held from July 4-7 2012, the European General Practice Research Network (EGPRN) has shown itself once again to be one of the most active organizations among the WONCA Europe networks.

The EGPRN Conference booth manned by the Executive Manager Ms Hanny Prick was quite busy since many participants seemed to appreciate EGPRN Policy: low conference fee, low membership fee with the added value of free on line access to the European Journal of General Practice and highly interactive conference with a reasonable number of participants.


EGPRN and EURIPA members met to chat in Vienna (from l to r): Jean Karl Soler, Malta (EGPRN executive); Tanya Pekez Pavlisko, (Croatia) EURIPA; Michael Kidd (WONCA president elect); José Lopez Albuin, Spain, (EURIPA President); John Wynn-Jones, UK (EURIPA, immediate past president); Oleg Kravtchenko, Norway, (EURIPA); Ferdinando Petrazzuoli, Italy (EGPRN executive); Christos Lionis, Greece (EURIPA and EGPRN).

EGPRN presentations at the WONCA Europe conference:

1) The International Classification of Primary Care (ICPC) and the hows and whys of classification systems in family medicine.

This symposium was organized and conducted by Drs J K Soler, I Kunnamo, F Petrazzuoli, N Buono, M Jamoulle.

It aimed to outline key features of the ICPC and its use in different health care systems in Europe, for documentation of practice content, and for research into diagnostic associations. The basic principles of classifying data with ICPC were presented, with practical examples. Because it reflects the essential elements of each patient/provider encounter and allows for the description of episodes of care, ICPC is fully compatible with and fully supports the use of problem oriented clinical records. Why it is the ideal tool to use to study the content of practice, and especially the process of diagnosis in primary care, was illustrated. Examples were shown on the simultaneous utilization of ICPC and ICD-10, which has been recommended by WICC and supported by the ICPC-ICD-10 mapping, published by WONCA.

2) TRANSFoRm symposium - improving patient safety in primary care.

This symposium was organized and lead by Drs B Delaney, J K Soler, D Corrigan, T N Arvanitis, V Curcin, R A Verheij, S Visscher, A Taweel.

TRANSFoRm is a collaborative research project for the integration of primary health care clinical and research activities, to support patient safety and clinical research. The first year of the project has defined three clinical research and three knowledge translation 'use cases' which will underpin the development of the software and its evaluation. An analysis of requirements of these use cases, linking to the relevant EU legal and ethical frameworks has informed the development of a confidentiality and privacy framework. This framework is reflected in plans to manage provenance (audit and tracking), security (access control) and the plans for development of the system architecture.

3) Using the Arts in Medical Education. How, Why, and does it work? EGPRN Workshop.

This workshop lead by Elaine Powley and was aimed at showing how using the arts as a tool and resource in learning and teaching can promote an enhanced capacity for communication and reflective practice; and encourage a holistic approach alongside science, leading to intuitive and creative responses in patient care. It was an interactive workshop exploring some of the methods to achieve this through exercises which use art, literature and poetry.

4) Writing for publication: a joint VdGM / EGPRN / EJGP workshop.

This highly interactive workshop was lead by Drs J Stoffers, T Freund, C Lygidakis, L Chovarda

The participants were both authors interested in research or medical writing with little or no previous experience in publishing and also more experienced authors willing to share their experiences. The aim of this workshop was to give participants knowledge about successfully preparing a manuscript for medical journal.

5) European translational research on the management of respiratory tract infections in primary care: implications for clinical practice and research. This symposium was organized and lead by S Coenen, T Verheij, C Butler, S de Vries-van Vugt, L Broekhuizen, M Godycki-Cwirko, H Goossens and E Hummers Pradier

Lower respiratory tract infections (LRTI) and acute cough are among the commonest acute conditions managed in primary care and a major reason for antibiotic prescribing. So far EGPRN has been actively promoting collaborative research and developed a research agenda for primary care, including challenging research on clinical diagnosis and prognosis, mixed methods, and translational research. The TRACE project (Translational Research on Antimicrobial resistance and Community-acquired infections in Europe) aims to consolidate the expertise within several European research programs, and to disseminate their results, in particular GRACE (Genomics to combat Resistance against Antibiotics in Community-acquired LRTI in Europe) focuses on the management of LRTI/acute cough. The GRACE project results were presented while the chairs fostered discussion on the presentations among the over-crowded audience.

6) Academic definition of multimorbidity a systematic review of literature

Oral presentation by Drs J Y Le Reste, N Patrice, C Lygidakis, C Doerr, L Heidrun, M Munoz, S Czachowski, M Fernandez, S Argyradiou, C Amélie, P Van Royen, C Lietard.

Multimorbidity is a new concept close to co-morbidity with a global vision in addition. This concept is deeply in touch with general practitioner core competencies as described by WONCA, and especially with the holistic modeling core competency. It could also help to detect frail patients in primary care before decompensation. However, as often for new concepts, its definition and subsequent operationalisation are still unclear. The presentation was aimed at find out more about the academic definition of multimorbidity via systematic qualitative review of literature with nine national teams from EGPRN. At the end the following definition was achieved:
Multimorbidity is defined as any combination of acute or chronic diseases with or without associated or non-associated biopsychosocial factors or risk factors. These factors may also function as modifiers, alongside the social network, the health care consumption and the coping strategies of the patient. It may modify the health outcomes and lead to an increased disability, a decreased quality of life or frailty.

7) Study FPDM (Depression and multimorbidity in family medicine): Systematic review of the literature: what validated tools are used for depression diagnosis and screening in general practice?

Oral presentation by Drs P Nabbe, J Y Le Reste, A Le Prielec, E Robert, S Czachowski, C Doer, H. Lingnier, M I San Martin Fernandez, M A Munoz, C Lygidakis, S Argyriadou, A Claveria, B Chiron, H Van Marwijk, P Van Royen, C Liétard.

Tools for depression screening and diagnosis in primary care have been available for several years, but their validity in practice is unclear. The objective of this presentation was to identify the tools validated against reference test. Systematic review of literature with ten national teams of the EGPRN was presented.

Ferdinando Petrazzuoli, MD, MSc (right in photo)
EGPRN Executive Board & Public Relation and Communication Committee
ferdinando.petrazzuoli@gmail.com

Jean Karl Soler, MD, MSc (centre in photo)
EGPRN Executive Board, Honorary Secretary & Public Relation and Communication Committee
jksoler@synapse.net.mt

Nicola Buono, MD
EGPRN Italian National Representative & Public Relation and Communication Committee
buono.nicola2@gmail.com

Hanny Prick (left in photo)
EGPRN Executive Manager
hanny.prick@maastrichtuniversity.nl