Textos sobre medicina y salud en la prensa diaria. Su potencial utilidad para la adquisición de competencias de grado en Medicina y Ciencias de la Salud.

Studies on journalistic texts related to health have become increasingly important, so we have studied the thematic distribution of press news on medicine and health published in the period 2001-2016, and explored its potential formative usefulness. A descriptive study was carried out of a set of news reports on medicine and health published in the newspaper El Pais over the course of 16 years that are included in the CONPRE-Oviedo collection. The news was distributed according to the International Classification of Diseases (ICD-10) or for its thematic content when it did not comply with ICD-10. A series of general competences of Order ECI 332/2008 were also identified that can be initiated through the educational use of journalistic texts.1828 news items were selected (mean: 114.3 / year). 63% can be classified by ICD-10, the most frequent being categories 1: Certain infectious and parasitic diseases; 15: Pregnancy, childbirth and the puerperium; 10: Diseases of the respiratory system and 2: Neoplasms. Of those not classified according to ICD-10, the most frequent were related to health management and public health. Two patterns of news appearance were detected: a continuous one, throughout the 16 years, and an incidental one. 35 competences to which journalistic texts can contribute have been identified and some examples are provided. In conclusion: a) in the written press there are texts referring to most of the diseases included in the ICD-10, which can contribute to health education. The journalistic treatment of this information may be incidental or maintained over time depending on the nature of the diseases; b) The teaching use of journalistic texts can contribute to the acquisition of transversal competences in undergraduate training in medicine and other health sciences.