The Primary Care Directorate of the Lanzarote Health Area has launched the Physiotherapy service in five health centers on the island, incorporating specialist professionals who will attend to patients referred from the Family Medicine field.
The Health Department points out that these physiotherapists will carry out activities in the area of "prevention, health promotion and family and community care." The measure is one of the actions planned in the Comprehensive Primary and Community Care Strategy 2022-2023 of the Canary Islands.
In recent months, the Management of the Lanzarote Health Services has undertaken improvements in the infrastructure and the spaces of the centers have been reorganized to have differentiated areas in which to provide this new service.
In this way, the physiotherapy consultations launched this week cover all the Basic Health Zones of the island: the Mala consultation covers the population of Teguise and Haría; the Yaiza consultation, in addition to the residents of the town, covers the Basic Health Zone of Tías; the Tinajo consultation also covers the population of San Bartolomé; the Arrecife consultation, located in the Titerroy Health Center, will serve the entire population of the capital and the Playa Blanca Health Center will do the same with the residents of the town.
The Primary Care Directorate considers that the incorporation of these physiotherapists in the first level of health care "will allow low-complexity pathologies to be assumed and treated" and will also contribute "to the improvement of the health status of patients through preventive, educational and health promotion activities."
The measure also responds "to the objective of providing the centers' staff with specialists who can respond to the care needs of the population and form a multidisciplinary team in each Basic Health Zone."
Treatments
The physiotherapists who have joined the Lanzarote health centers will attend to patients referred by Family Medicine professionals with processes that involve a mild functional disability and are included in certain pathologies such as those of the hip, shoulder, knee, ankle, neck pain or lower back pain.
For its part, other more serious ailments or those derived from other pathologies will be referred to Specialized Care at the Doctor José Molina Orosa University Hospital.
All these treatments try to improve the quality of life of patients and their functional capacity, reducing the symptoms with pain relief. On the other hand, in addition to expanding the portfolio of Primary Care services, physiotherapy improves the resolution capacity of the centers, guarantees continuity of care and allows treatments for patients to be expedited.