SPECIAL COMMUNICATION Community Service by North Carolina Family Physicians

Background: Community service is an integral part of American society. Although Family Medicine advo-cates community service through community medicine, few data exist on family physicians ’ involvement in voluntary community service activities or roles as community advocates. Methods: A questionnaire was mailed to 489 North Carolina family physicians, including a 20 % ran-dom sample of those in community practice and all statewide faculty physicians. The survey assessed types and amount of volunteer activity, attitudes toward volunteer work, and factors that support or inhibit participation in community service. Results: The overall response rate was 54%. Most respondents reported strong interests in commu-nity service before medical school and residency, yet few reported any relevant training during medical education. More than 85 % of faculty and community practice family physicians reported participating in volunteer service in the previous year (70.8 mean hours for faculty vs 45.5 mean hours for community practice; P .06). Family physicians also reported a wide variety of lifetime volunteer activities (mean number of different faculty physician activities 20.8 vs mean number of different community practice physician activities 16.7, P .00). Less than 50 % of both physician groups reported that their practice or program publicly supports those performing community service