House Officers’ Choice of Family Medicine Specialty amid the Implementation of the New Universal Health Insurance Law

Abstract

Background The new Egyptian Universal Health Insurance Law is introduced through family-oriented primary health care. Increasing the number of recent graduates who specialized in family medicine is considered a national need to overcome family physicians’ shortage. Aim To explore the factors affecting the house officers’ choice of Family Medicine as a future career amid the implementation of the new Universal Health Insurance Law in Egypt. Methods This is a cross-sectional study conducted on house officers during their training in Cairo university hospitals from the first of March 2020 to February 2021. The researchers offered an anonymous self-administered questionnaire to all house officers at the beginning of their 2-week family medicine training (1170 house officers). Results A total of 1052 completed the questionnaire (response rate 90%). Family medicine as a specialty was considered by 53.6% (n = 564) of participants, while only 23.4% (n = 246) of participants had an obvious intention to choose family medicine. Multivariate (adjusted) logistic regression model revealed that factors significantly associated with intention to choose family medicine were marital status, knowledge about governmental advantages for family medicine offered to the specialized recent graduates, and previously encountered with family practice as customers. Conclusions The choice of family medicine specialty is increasing among house officers. This could be attributed to the growing interest in family medicine in Egypt, especially after implementing the new insurance law’s first phase in several Egyptian governorates.