[Family medicine research: analysis of papers accepted at national and international congresses].

Objective: To analyse the thematic content and the origin of the free papers presented at four Family Medicine conferences (two national and two international) during 1992 and 1993; and to check the possibility of differences between Spanish and international lines of research.
Design: Descriptive study.
Measurements and Main Results: A total of 1,339 papers were classified. There were statistically significant differences (p < 0.001) in the thematic areas of Family Medicine (25.33% in international conferences, 7.77% national), Community Medicine (18.16% international, 28.20% national) and organisation of care (17.68% international, 30.16% national). The provinces with the highest number of contributions at national conferences were Barcelona, Madrid, Valencia and Zaragoza. At international conferences (WONCA) the greatest number of contributions came from the Scandinavian countries, Holland, the United Kingdom, Israel and Spain.
Conclusions: Spanish investigators do not often tackle questions of under- and post-graduate training, professional attitude, clinical interviews or Bioethics. The papers at national conferences come mainly, in quantitative terms, from large provinces. The lower participation of liberal health systems like the German, French and North-American is noticeable.