Objectives: To describe the use of consultations, the place where care is given and referral demand, in function of episodes of illness and the demographic context.
Design: An observational, prospective study based on a year-long record.
Setting: 43 practices spread over 10 Autonomous Communities.
Interventions: Identification, date of birth and sex of each patient attended, date of their first consultation and the number of consultations per episode, the health problem, place of consultation and existence or otherwise of referral, were all recorded.
Results: 74.57% in the rural areas, 56.21% in the urban and 56.74% in the mixed saw the doctor over the year. In the rural context there were 2.26 consultations per episode and 5.41 consultations per person, against 1.88 and 4.55 in the urban context. Figures for the mixed context were in between. In all the illness groups (except that for accidents) the number of consultations per episode in the urban context: 13.90% against 10.74 in the rural.
Conclusions: Greater use of the doctor in rural areas could be because of the lower population/doctor ratio and easier access. Higher referral rates in urban areas could be due to the closeness of the second care level. A low percentage of home consultations was observed.