Background
: Computer use in medicine is also incresing now in primary health care. Untill now, there has been no report on the clinical use of computer in family pracice in Korea.

Methods : Among 525 members of Korean Academy of Family Physicians woh are in primary practice in Seoul, 297 physicaian's office telephone numbers are on phone-directory. In August 1993, four-page questionnaires were sent to 297 physicians. To get higher response rate was 52%. To compensate low response rate, phone interview of 38 physician was done by random sampling of nonresponders.

Results : 79% of responders currently use computer in clinic, while 32% use computer personally. There were no differences between responders and nonresponders in sex, rate of computer use, but mean age of responders is lower than that of nonresponders(50.8±13.5 vs. 57.1±10.9). Among clinical usages of computer, billing is by far common(100%). Medical record retrieval systems anre used by 26.4%, Drug management by 14.6% of physicians with computers in their offices. Only one physician used complete electronic medical record.

Conclusion : Majority of family physicians in primary health care use computer in clinic. But the use is confined to a few areas. Among the variabels, age and personal computer use seem to be related to the number of arease used. Major obstacles to the medical computing are 'not acquainted with computer use', 'lack of standardization of programs'. So there are urgent needs for education of computing and standardization of programs.