Family and Community Medicine in Uruguay from 1997 to 2019: how many kilometers will it take to reach that town?

The Family and Community Medicine Residency started in Uruguay in 1997. Through a self-managed process, the first generations were molded into training that integrated hospital knowledge and experience with territorial praxis in a community-based health service with a population of reference. The academic recognition of the specialty and the installation of the institutional areas for its management were achievements parallel to that process in the first decade. The second decade was marked by the territorial teaching-assistance expansion in the country, university decentralization and the active participation of Family and Community Medicine in the Health Reform, and the country's rights agenda. The third decade of the specialty begins with a crisis triggered by the sustained decline in the aspiration for residency. An initial approach to explanations reflects on the possibility of facing a more profound crisis and the need to find the keys to a 21st century Medicine that allows us to achieve the principles of Alma-Ata that are still current.