The Family Tree Spreads its Limbs: National Academy of Medicine Family Physician New Members 2021

Abstract

We are now about 2 years into the COVID-19 pandemic and although great progress has been made with vaccines, medical management, and public health response, globally between 5 and 10 thousand people are still dying from COVID-19 every day. Family medicine health services delivery has changed dramatically and continues to evolve in response to the pandemic. In this issue of Annals of Family Medicine, we are publishing a collection of original research articles focused on assessing the impact of the pandemic in family medicine.Sisó-Almirall et al estimated the impact of the pandemic on new diagnoses of common chronic conditions such as hypertension and diabetes in primary care. 1 Using data from a cohort of almost 90,000 patients of 3 primary care centers in Spain and comparing pandemic incidence rates to rates during the 3 years prior to the pandemic, authors showed an astonishing reduction of incident diagnosis. For many chronic conditions, only about 50% to 60% of expected new cases were detected. This corresponds to the 41% drop in face-toface visits for chronic disease detection and likely represents missed opportunities to intervene early in the course of a disease rather than an actual decrease in disease incidence. These undiagnosed cases will eventually present at more advanced stages with less favorable outcomes and will further increase the demand on our already depleted health care infrastructure.Although much has been written about the impact of the rapid transition to telehealth on physicians and care teams, the impact on patients and their family members is less apparent. In a survey of caregivers of older adult patients, Raj et al asked caregivers about their experiences with telehealth. 2 Caregivers who were colocated with the patient could assist with the technical set up for visits. However, most caregivers were not colocated with patients and although telehealth visits facilitated remote caregiver participation, the technical challenges were more difficult to overcome.Ha et al describe a program of targeted outreach by 1 family medicine residency team to increase vaccination rates among their patients. 3 Using publicly available vaccination rate data, the team identified communities with low vaccination rates, reviewed medical charts for patients in those communities to identify unvaccinated patients, and then reached out by telephone to provide information and appointments for vaccinations. Their efforts paid off with 39% of those