ОБЩЕСТВЕНОТО МНЕНИЕ ЗА ИЗВЪНБОЛНИЧНА МЕДИЦИНСКА ПОМОЩ В УСЛОВИЯТА НА COVID -19
PUBLIC OPINION ON OUTPATIENT MEDICAL CARE IN THE CONDITIONS OF COVID-19

Summary/Abstract: On the 30th of January 2020 the World Health Organization (WHO) announced a Public Health Emergency of International Concern relating to the spread of a coronavirus infectionn, later named COVID-19. On the 11th of March, due to the quick spread of COVID-19, WHO defined the situations as “pandemic”. The scale of the situation, which arose from the coronavirus’ emergence, is unprecedented. This necessitated the worldwide implementations of new measures, which strained the capacity of healthcare systems. This fact was the reason why a survey was conducted among 531 patients from all over the country regarding the organization of outpatient care (primary, specialist and emergency care) and the change of their access to it in the period between March 2020 and April 2021. The data analysis shows that the in-person access to general practitioners has become easier in over half survey participants /51.41%/ due to the smaller number of patients seeking in-person consultations for the period; the communication with GPs through phone calls and modern information and communications technologies has become more prevalent; there is disparity in the access to specialized outpatient medical care – over a half (55.93%) find that accessing a specialist has become harder due to the specialist being absent (31.16%) or having a full schedule (21.66%). There are also issues connected to the scarcity of human resources in emergency medical care.

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