Primary health care physicians' knowledge of prophylactics of drug abuse.

The purpose of the study was the evaluation of the assumptions of drug addiction prophylactics and its realization in the practice of primary health care physicians as well as determination of the possibilities of introducing changes in the training of physicians which would favour the increase and extension of knowledge in this field. The method applied in the study was a survey based on the questionnaire distributed among 410 primary health care physicians who attended up-dating courses on family medicine organized by the Institute of Rural Medicine in Lublin. The results were statistically analyzed with application of Excel Statistica Stargraf 6.0 software and the authors' own programmes. The results indicate that primary health care physician's basic and limited knowledge on drug abuse originates from university studies and it is limited to information concerning the reasons, mechanisms, medical effects and some methods of treatment. In the procedures created for the practice of primary health care physicians direct activities related to the drug abuse prophylactics are not considered but only a general health care in the region. However, indirectly the primary health care physicians and family physicians realize so called educational care in the region by cooperating with the nurses and midwives employed in the region or in so called practice of a family physician where educational packages are created, ie. prophylactics of addiction.