Author Description

This is the second in a series of four works designed to classify the components of the primary medical care interaction. It has been developed and field tested by the World Organization of National Colleges, Academies, and Academic Associations of General Practitioners/Family Physicians(WONCA) Classification Committee in concert with an ad hoc committee of the North American Primary Care Research Group. The interactions under analysis begin with the initial contact with a health care provider and include each step in the process: diagnostic, therapeutic, administrative, and finaldisposition or follow-up plans. The first book in the series, ICHPPC-2, coded the diagnostic part of the encounter. The latest volume makes it possible to code, classify, and count such valued and cost-effective modalities as listening, counseling, instructing, and educating patients and theirfamilies. Until now these aspects of health care provision have been omitted or downplayed by process analysts, even though they provide among the most instrumental therapeutic interventions. Their classification extends the ability to code for the first time to the efforts of health care personnelon the primary care level.