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September 23, 2025Open Access

Conceptual and philosophical bases the practice of family medicine

Key Points

Family medicine emerged from Greek medical traditions, evolving significantly by the early 20th century, highlighting its roots.
Key figures like William Osler revitalized generalist practices, encouraging a focus on the patient rather than just the disease.
From the 1950s, a movement sought to reclaim generalist perspectives, integrating preventive and community-oriented care.
The establishment of family and community medicine created a specialty emphasizing a holistic view of patients in their social context.

Abstract

This article, through a bibliographic review, aims to recount the origins of family medicine in the early days of Greek medical tradition and how its fundamental principles evolved over the centuries up to the early 20th century. Technological innovation and scientific advances between the two world wars led to a high degree of medical specialization, to the detriment of generalist approaches. However, prominent medical figures such as William Osler and others revived the concepts of general medicine, integrability, and holism, focusing their practice not on the disease but on the patient. From the 1950s onward, a movement emerged to reclaim the generalist medical perspective from a biopsychosocial standpoint, incorporating preventive, social, and community aspects. These laid the conceptual and philosophical foundations of a new medical specialty known as family and community medicine in the UK, the US, and Canada. This article describes how the first family physicians established the conceptual bases of this specialty around several core pillars: the biopsychosocial dimension, a comprehensive view of the patient within their family, social, and environmental context, and the incorporation of humanistic principles into bedside medical practice.

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