The youth-centricity of three university-associated general practices

Abstract

Background and objectives Young people are poor attenders of mainstream general practice; however, university general practices may be an exception, given the age demographic of the population from which they draw patients. The objective of this article was to explore the youth-centricity of 12 months of encounter data from three university-associated general practices: Queensland University of Technology (QUT) in Brisbane, University of New South Wales (UNSW) in Sydney and the University of Melbourne (UniMelb). Method Encounter data from January to December 2016 were extracted from information management software and analysed using SPSS Statistics 24. Results The highest percentages of encounters were with patients aged 20–24 years at QUT (39.8%), UNSW (40.6%) and UniMelb (40%). Discussion The age encounter data from the general practices associated with QUT, UNSW and UniMelb demonstrate their youth-centricity, with almost 50% of encounters with patients aged 15–24 years. This result is unsurprising given the age demographic from which these practices draw patients, but a proportional under-representation of younger students suggests possible access issues that require further research. Questions regarding the role of these and other Australian university-associated general practices in the health of young people attending university are signposted for future enquiry.