The role of primary care in management of rare diseases in Ireland.

Background: 'Slaintecare' aims to address complex patient care needs in an integrated fashion with an emphasis on patient-centred, patient-empowered community care.Currently there is a lack of knowledge of the impact of rare disease management in primary care and of the information tools required by general practitioners to deliver integrated care for rare disease patients.

Aims: To complete a pilot survey to estimate the general practice clinical workload attributable to selected rare diseases and assess the use of relevant information sources.

A multidisciplinary primary care team consultation in a socio-economically deprived community: an exploratory randomised controlled trial.

Background: Psychosocial problems in socioeconomically deprived communities are not always amenable to traditional medical approaches. Mothers living in these areas are a particularly vulnerable group. The objective of this study was to evaluate the effectiveness of a lengthened multi-disciplinary team consultation in primary care in reducing anxiety and depression in mothers.