HEALTH PROMOTION PRIORITIES FOR GENERAL-PRACTICE - CONSTRUCTING AND USING INDICATIVE PREVALENCES

Objective-To construct indicative prevalences for a range of diseases and risk markers and use them in planning health promotion interventio ns in primary health care. Design-Indicative prevalences comprised poi nt prevalence, incidence, and mortality measures. Use of data from Off ice of Population Censuses and Surveys, Northern Regional Health Autho rity, and Newcastle health and lifestyle survey 1991, and research pap ers to determine prevalence adjusted for age and sex in a hypothetical practice with a list of 10 000 patients. Setting-Newcastle upon Tyne, England. Results-Indicative prevalences were highest for common risk markers such as failure to achieve exercise targets (6871), moderate t o extreme obesity (2785),and smoking (2689); moderate for overt diseas e such as angina (175) and stroke (20/year); and low for events such a s suicide (1/year) and deaths from malignant melanoma (2/10 years). Co nclusions-Given limited time and resources, brief interventions to red uce smoking and the systematic case finding and management of patients with hypertension, angina, and previous myocardial infarction are lik ely to be the highestpriorities for health promotion in primary care.