Barriers Facing Primary Health Care Physicians When Dealing with Emergency Cases in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia

OBJECTIVES- To estimate the prevalence of emergency cases reporting to Primary Health Care centers (PHC), Jeddah, Saudi Arabia and to explore the barriers facing PHC physicians when dealing with such emergency cases.METHODS- A cross-sectional analytic study, where all physicians working in the PHC of the Ministry of Health (MOH) in Jeddah; were invited to participate (n=247). The study period was from July 2013 till December 2013. Data were collected through two sources. 1- A self-administered questionnaire used to determine the physicians’ perceived competence when dealing with emergency cases. 2- A structured observation sheet used to evaluate availability of equipment, drugs, ambulances and other supporting facilities required to deal with emergency cases.RESULTS- The response rate was 83.4%. The physicians’ age ranged between 25 and 60 years with a mean ±SD of 34.4±7.5 years. Majority of them (83.5%) did not attend ATLS courses at all whereas 60.7% never attended ACLS courses. The majority (97.1%) had however attended BLS courses. Physicians in the age group 36-45 years, non-Saudi, those who had SBFM, those who reported experience in working in emergency departments and physicians who reported more working years in PHCCs (>5 years) had a significant higher score of perceived level of competence in performing emergency skill scale than others (P<0.05). The prevalence of emergency cases attending PHC in Jeddah (2013) was 5.2%.CONCLUSION- Emergency services at PHC in Jeddah are functioning reasonably well, but require fine tuning of services and an upgrade in their quality.