Robert Higgins takes helm at WONCA
Focus: regions with inadequate health systems, too few FPs
Dr. Higgins Rear Adm. Robert W. Higgins, M.D., of Anacortes, Wash., may be retired. But his passion for international family practice keeps him busy -- no matter what time zone he's in.
Higgins' determination to spread the specialty has led him to many parts of the world and, on June 18, will make him president of WONCA, the World Organization of Family Doctors.
During his three-year presidency, Higgins aims to support rural health and help developing nations adopt health systems based on primary care. Many such countries are in Latin America, Africa and the Middle East/South Asia.
"Until you have a healthy workforce, you can't have a strong economy," said Higgins, an AAFP past president and current chair of AAFP's delegation to the AMA. WONCA, formed in 1974, has member organizations from 59 countries. It collaborates with the World Health Organization and health ministries in developing countries.
Higgins' first brush with international health care came in 1966, when he was drafted into the Navy and was sent to Vietnam's Mekong Delta. Vietnamese physicians worked in the larger cities, and rural areas had only native health remedies.
As WONCA's president-elect, Higgins visited many countries. "Some countries have their priorities wrong," he said. "They may provide liver transplants to the affluent rather than basic health care for the majority." In Argentina, however, Higgins met with leaders of the construction workers' union that provides health care for about six million people. "Their old health system -- based on subspecialty care -- cost too much and didn't meet the needs of their people," said Higgins. "The union converted to a family practice system, paid off its debts and built better facilities with its savings. I was im-pressed with the care FPs provided in the union's Buenos Aires clinic."
When Higgins was in Malaysia, he had dinner with FPs in Sarawak on the island of Borneo. The dean of the new medical school attended the dinner, giving Higgins the opportunity to talk with him about the importance of having a strong family medicine department.
WONCA has expertise in curriculum and health system reform. "We have the tools; we just have to get them to the right people," said Higgins.
FP Report is published by the AAFP News Department. Copyright © 1998 by American Academy of Family Physicians.
