Eustat

Press release 27/12/2011

STATISTCS ON NON-HOSPITAL PUBLIC HEALTHCARE in the Basque Country. 2009

Medical centres attend to 64% of non-hospital consultations

General medical consultations grew by 0.3% and paediatric consultations by 2%

The 472 non-hospital public healthcare centres in the Basque Country attended 14.5 million medical consultations, 0.5% more than in 2008, according to Eustat data. The volume of assistance meant that each inhabitant went to the doctor an average of 6.7 times in 2009.

Of the public care centres, medical centres – a primary care benchmark – received the highest number of visits in 2009 (63.6%), followed by out-patient surgeries (or specialised centres) with 18.8%; the surgeries and outlying centres most commonly found in rural areas (7.4%); emergency services (5.4%); and employers’ liability insurance and mental health centres around 2%.

Specializations related to basic healthcare: General and family medicine (10.3 million consultations) and paediatrics (1.8 million), attended 83% of the demands for non-hospital healthcare assistance. The two specializations showed an increase in the number of consultations with respect to 2008 that was more moderate in general and family medicine (+0.3%) than in paediatrics (+2%).

The remaining 17% of medical consultations (2.4 million) involved specialised care. Of these, the most frequently visited were: traumatology (392,530 consultations), psychiatry (325,514), gynaecology (289,274) and ophthalmology (228,776).

To meet the demand, 8,061 people worked in the Basque non-hospital public healthcare system in 2009. Of these, 77.2% were healthcare personnel (3,049 physicians and 2,559 nurses). In non-hospital employment, the majority of medical personnel were women (53%) – especially in paediatrics (70%) – and the majority was even higher amongst nursing personnel (92%) and non-healthcare personnel (68%).

The average number of consultations per year and physician was 4,810 and even higher for general and family doctors (5,832) who were the physicians who attended the highest number of consultations, together with paediatricians (5,377). Dermatologists (4,584 consultations), traumatologists (3,774), ophthalmologists (3,575), and urologists and endocrinologists, with close to 3,400 consultations, followed at a greater distance.

Basque public health care allocated 577 million euros to non-hospital healthcare in 2009, up 7.4% from 2008, with healthcare representing 0.9% of the Basque Country’s GDP.

Of the total expenditure, 97.2% (560 million euros) was for running costs and 2.8% for capital investment (16.4 million). 85.3% of the running costs were for personnel.

For further information:

Basque Statistics Office
C/ Donostia-San Sebastián, 1 01010 Vitoria-Gasteiz
Tel: +34-945-01 75 00 Fax:+34-945-01 75 01 E-mail: eustat@eustat.es
Contact: Matxalen Plágaro Alonso
Tel: +34-945-01 75 48 Fax:+34-945-01 75 01
More press releases on Non-Hospital Public Healthcare Statistics
Non-Hospital Public Healthcare Statistics Database