Formación de personal médico de pregrado en atención primaria. El caso de la Universidad de la Salud.

Primary health care (PHC) is an intersectoral strategy for the development of people's health. It includes the organization of medical and health care systems and social development actions on the determinants of health, under the principles of law, equity, social justice, respect for cultural diversity, health promotion, coverage and universal access to all preventive and curative services, use of appropriate technologies and promotion of social and community participation. The MAS-Bienestar health care model in Mexico considers PHC as the foundation of the sustainability of the public health system. It requires a determined policy of strategic training of human resources for health, oriented towards PHC. Key experiences in the training of physicians in PHC are reviewed, presenting the case of the Universidad de la Salud (Unisa, in Spanish) and the curricular proposal of the degree in General and Community Medicine, as clues to reorient training in general medicine. The greatest challenge for the training of health professionals with a PHC approach is to exercise joint leadership of the education and health sectors, to create a national system of strategic training of health personnel, guaranteeing their insertion into the public system. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]