Vínculo universidad-sociedad a través de la percepción de médicos y pacientes diabéticos sobre su enfermedad

The Cuban Medical Education has achieved health indicators similar to those of developed countries with a higher accessibility, more achievable and with more equity. The prevalence of diabetes mellitus in Cuba is of 30 by 1 000 inhabitants. OBJECTIVE: To identify the university-society link through the physicians and diabetic person's perception on disease. METHODS: A survey among family physicians (10) and 88 diabetic persons was conducted. The programs of the career of Medicine related to diabetes mellitus were reviewed. RESULTS: The ten interviewed family physicians were graduated of Integral General Medicine; the 80 % would like to be updated on dietetic and integral treatment, the 60% in psychological care, the 40% in podalic care to patient and the 100 % in vascular complications, the health problems of their patients: kidney disease (18.2 %), retinal disease (9.1 %), diabetic foot (4.5 %), diabetic neuropathy (11.4 %) limbs amputation (2.2 %) and cardiovascular diseases (22.7 %). With relation to disease guiding offered by family physician to diabetic patients the 54.5 % answered that it was good, the 27.7 % that it was regular, the 13.6 % that it was poor and the 4.6 % that there was not any guiding. CONCLUSION: It was evidence that university-society linking must to be strengthen to achieve that Integral General Medicine specialists have a greater training for integral care of diabetic patients and thus to improve their quality of life.