Collection: Revista Chilena de Medicina Familiar

Menstruation disorders are a common cause of office visits in female adolescents and can cause great anxiety and concern among patients and their parents. These disorders can be transient during puberty due to the immaturity of the hypothalamus —pituitary— ovary axis. This article reviews and updates the most common menstruation disorders to improve their management in primary care. The primary care physician must be able to identify; certain pathologies that can appear at this age and to identify situations in which a menstrual flow alteration should be referred to the secondary or tertiary level for further study or treatment.

In this article we will review clinical and epidemiological aspects of sudden death in the designated age group, the national situation in terms of official health policies concerning the subject and the evidence based screening methods used internationally, to try to contribute to the development of a national consensus, effective, efficient and feasible to implement in Primary Healthcare.

En pacientes con artrosis de rodilla, el tratamiento durante 6 meses combinando condroitín sulfato y glucosamina no mejora el dolor en comparación a placebo y AINES. Sin embargo, su uso podría ser útil en disminuir el dolor en el subgrupo de pacientes con dolor moderado a severo. Además, el uso de condroitín sulfato  disminuye la incidencia de eventos de derrame intraarticular en todos los pacientes.

En pacientes diabéticos sin eventos cardiovasculares previos el uso de tratamiento hipolipemiante con estatinas reduce el riesgo relativo de eventos cardiovasculares en un 21%.

Paciente de sexo masculino, R.I.N, 39 años de edad, fumador de media cajetilla de cigarrillos al día, otros antecedentes mayores de riesgo cardiovascular y mórbidos de importancia. Inicio cuadro de disconfort retroesternal mal definido, de 2 horas de duración, no relacionado a esfuerzo, no irradiado, asociado a disnea, mareo y fatigabilidad.

Introduction: Approximately 14,000 people died in Chile because of smoking related diseases in 2002. Tobacco companies affirm that smokers know about the smoking health risks. However, medical evidence concludes the opposite. Objectives: To study the level of knowledge and the personal risk perception of smoking related diseases in a group of current smokers in Santiago. Methods: A voluntary survey was administered by trained interviewers to 251 current smokers consulting in two Family Medicine centers in Santiago, between April and June 2006. Results: 27% of respondents answered incorrectly questions about smoking health effects. 43% of respondents do not perceived a greater personal risk of cancer or acute myocardial infarction respect to other people of the same age. Conclusions: An important percentage of current smokers do not know the effects of smoking on heath and only a half of them perceive a greater personal health risk. lt is necessary to apply public health strategies in order to improve the knowledge and the personal risk perception of smoking health effects. Medical advice should be also improved.

Equity is one of the objectives of the current health reform. For promoting equity in primary health care, the financing mechanism must adjust for the socioeconomic status of the beneficiaries. The objective of this work was to revise the current formula and propose an alternative and most accurate indicator. The current indicator of poverty (municipality ‘s financial power) shows low correlation with the information from the National Survey of Socioeconomic Status (CASEN) for 2003 (R2 = 0.38). In contrast, the Public Health Fund (FONASA) definition of poverty (Group A) shows a significant improvement (R2 = 0.59).

El término integridad profesional o profesionalismo, como suele traducirse al esañol la palabra professionalism, es el termino que designa un movimiento de carácter ético, originado en ámbitos académicos de los EE.UU. en los años ochenta, por el que se definen los rasgos esenciales del buen hacer de la profesión médica. Abarca aspectos aspectos como la reflexión sobre los valores de la profesión, la actuación profesional (praxis) correcta y las implicaciones curriculares en pre y post grado.

Nowadays, oral child’s health is one of our country’s priorities. Promotion of an adequate oral hygiene should be frequently discussed with patients and parents, both as primary and secondary prevention. On the other hand, even so dental caries are highly prevalent, we doctors have very little information in the subject. Consequently, we don’t get involved in the field very often. The present article is intended to review  general aspects of etiopathology of caries and what are the recommendations we shouId follow as primary care physicians to prevent them in pediatric population. The appropriate timing for stating toothbrushing or when to prescribe toothpaste are some of the aspects discussed, making an emphasis in critical appraisal of the literature.