Senior onderzoeker Huisartsenzorg
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Fitness or football on medical advice: are health professional (ready for) collaborating with local exercise providers.
Leemrijse, C., Veenhof, C., Bakker, D. de. Fitness or football on medical advice: are health professional (ready for) collaborating with local exercise providers.: , 2014.
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Background: In the Western world, especially people with a lower socioeconomic status, overweight people, and people with (increased risk of) chronic conditions are insufficiently physically active. Apparently, these groups need extra support to start exercising. General practitioners (GPs) see the majority of their patient population at least once a year. Therefore, they are in the unique position to identify patients who are insufficiently active and have, or are at risk for, inactivity related health problems, and can motivate these people to take more exercise. Since physical activity is basically not a medical issue, exercising should preferably take place outside the health care setting. Acquaintance and collaboration between GPs and local exercise providers is important. Goal: first, to investigate whether GPs refer their patients to local sports- and exercise facilities outside the health care setting, and whether GPs are collaborating (or willing to collaborate) with exercise providers. Second, to investigate how local exercise providers experience their role in stimulating physical activity of sedentary people and whether they are cooperating (or willing to cooperate) with GPs. Methods: A written questionnaire was sent to a random sample of 800 GPs in the Netherlands. A number of local exercise providers were interviewed by telephone. Results: All GPs (response 43%) recommended their patients sometimes to take more physical exercise and most GPs also specifically referred them. Although most patients were referred to a physical therapist within the health care setting (69%), some GPs also indicated to refer to a local fitness centre (54%) or another local exercise facility (37%). However, actual number of referrals to a fitness club or other facilities in the community were low (< 20% of the patients). Seventeen per cent of the GPs participated in a formal alliance to stimulate physical activity. Almost 75% of the other GPs would be interested in participating in a collaboration structure if this was locally available. GPs participating in a formal alliance more often referred patients to a local fitness centre or sports facility(<0.05). GPs not participating were less informed about local exercise facilities and more often mentioned this as a reason for omitting referral. Although 32% of the GPs mentioned good collaboration as stimulating for referring more patients to local movement facilities, regular meetings with sports providers were considered little attractive. Local sports- and exercise providers themselves all thought they had a role in stimulating physical activity of inactive people. Collaboration with GPs is still limited. Some of them were keen on more collaboration, but felt that they are not always taken seriously by GPs. Conclusion: GPs can play an important role in stimulating healthy physical activity in sedentary patients, but are taking this role insufficiently yet. Acquaintance and cooperation of GPs with local sports providers can be a good opportunity to enhance this role. However, cooperation between health care providers and sports providers should be simple and take a minimum of extra work. In this presentation, practical recommendations are given on the development of such a collaboration, based on local needs and opportunities.
Background: In the Western world, especially people with a lower socioeconomic status, overweight people, and people with (increased risk of) chronic conditions are insufficiently physically active. Apparently, these groups need extra support to start exercising. General practitioners (GPs) see the majority of their patient population at least once a year. Therefore, they are in the unique position to identify patients who are insufficiently active and have, or are at risk for, inactivity related health problems, and can motivate these people to take more exercise. Since physical activity is basically not a medical issue, exercising should preferably take place outside the health care setting. Acquaintance and collaboration between GPs and local exercise providers is important. Goal: first, to investigate whether GPs refer their patients to local sports- and exercise facilities outside the health care setting, and whether GPs are collaborating (or willing to collaborate) with exercise providers. Second, to investigate how local exercise providers experience their role in stimulating physical activity of sedentary people and whether they are cooperating (or willing to cooperate) with GPs. Methods: A written questionnaire was sent to a random sample of 800 GPs in the Netherlands. A number of local exercise providers were interviewed by telephone. Results: All GPs (response 43%) recommended their patients sometimes to take more physical exercise and most GPs also specifically referred them. Although most patients were referred to a physical therapist within the health care setting (69%), some GPs also indicated to refer to a local fitness centre (54%) or another local exercise facility (37%). However, actual number of referrals to a fitness club or other facilities in the community were low (< 20% of the patients). Seventeen per cent of the GPs participated in a formal alliance to stimulate physical activity. Almost 75% of the other GPs would be interested in participating in a collaboration structure if this was locally available. GPs participating in a formal alliance more often referred patients to a local fitness centre or sports facility(<0.05). GPs not participating were less informed about local exercise facilities and more often mentioned this as a reason for omitting referral. Although 32% of the GPs mentioned good collaboration as stimulating for referring more patients to local movement facilities, regular meetings with sports providers were considered little attractive. Local sports- and exercise providers themselves all thought they had a role in stimulating physical activity of inactive people. Collaboration with GPs is still limited. Some of them were keen on more collaboration, but felt that they are not always taken seriously by GPs. Conclusion: GPs can play an important role in stimulating healthy physical activity in sedentary patients, but are taking this role insufficiently yet. Acquaintance and cooperation of GPs with local sports providers can be a good opportunity to enhance this role. However, cooperation between health care providers and sports providers should be simple and take a minimum of extra work. In this presentation, practical recommendations are given on the development of such a collaboration, based on local needs and opportunities.