Primary Health Care Definitions

Primary Health Care Definitions and Basic Requirements

• Primary Health Care (PHC) is an approach that focuses on essential health care, based on practical, scientifically sound, and socially acceptable methods and technologies, made universally accessible to individuals and families in the community through their full participation and at a cost the community and country can afford to maintain.
• The Alma-Ata Declaration (1978) called for urgent action by all governments, health and development workers, and the world community to protect and promote the health of all people using the Primary Health Care approach.

Problems with Health Care Services

• Urban-oriented
• Curative in nature
• Accessible to a small part of the population

Objectives of PHC

• Define Primary Health Care approach
• Identify differences between medical care and health care
• List, define, and explain the basic requirements for sound PHC (the 8 A's and the 3 C's)

The 8 A's of PHC

• Appropriateness: Whether the service is needed in relation to essential human needs, priorities, and policies.
• Availability: Medical care can be obtained whenever people need it, ensuring health service coverage in all areas.
• Adequacy: Services are proportionate to requirements, sufficient to meet the needs and demands of a community.
• Accessibility: Reachable, convenient services, with geographic, economic, and cultural accessibility.
• Acceptability: Care depends on satisfactory communication, trust, confidentiality, and privacy of information shared with providers.
• Affordability: Cost is within the means and resources of individuals and countries.
• Assessability: Medical care can be readily evaluated.
• Accountability: Regular review of financial records by certified public accountants is feasible.

The 3 C's of PHC

• Completeness: Adequate attention to all aspects of a medical problem, including prevention, early detection, diagnosis, treatment, follow-up measures, and rehabilitation.
• Comprehensiveness: Care is provided for all types of health problems.
• Continuity: Management of a patient's care over time is coordinated among providers.

Community Participation

• Meaningful involvement of the community in planning, implementation, and maintenance of health services.
• Maximum reliance on local resources such as manpower, money, and materials.

Essential Services

• Needed and important for improving the health status of the community.
• Cannot go without, e.g., immunization.

Primary Care vs. Health Care

• Primary care is not primary health care alone, but the organization of a full range of health care, from home to hospital, with prevention as equally important as cure.
• Medical care is personal services provided by physicians, while health care is services provided to individuals or communities by health professionals, promoting, maintaining, and restoring health.

Goal of Health Care System

• To provide the best possible health services for everyone, everywhere in the district, assuring adequate access to quality care at a reasonable price (equity of provision and equity in utilization of services).
• Achieving better health care for all is the goal of public health programs.

Primary Health Care Definitions and Basic Requirements

• Primary Health Care (PHC) is an approach that focuses on essential health care, based on practical, scientifically sound, and socially acceptable methods and technologies, made universally accessible to individuals and families in the community through their full participation and at a cost the community and country can afford to maintain.
• The Alma-Ata Declaration (1978) called for urgent action by all governments, health and development workers, and the world community to protect and promote the health of all people using the Primary Health Care approach.

Problems with Health Care Services

• Urban-oriented
• Curative in nature
• Accessible to a small part of the population

Objectives of PHC

• Define Primary Health Care approach
• Identify differences between medical care and health care
• List, define, and explain the basic requirements for sound PHC (the 8 A's and the 3 C's)

The 8 A's of PHC

• Appropriateness: Whether the service is needed in relation to essential human needs, priorities, and policies.
• Availability: Medical care can be obtained whenever people need it, ensuring health service coverage in all areas.
• Adequacy: Services are proportionate to requirements, sufficient to meet the needs and demands of a community.
• Accessibility: Reachable, convenient services, with geographic, economic, and cultural accessibility.
• Acceptability: Care depends on satisfactory communication, trust, confidentiality, and privacy of information shared with providers.
• Affordability: Cost is within the means and resources of individuals and countries.
• Assessability: Medical care can be readily evaluated.
• Accountability: Regular review of financial records by certified public accountants is feasible.

The 3 C's of PHC

• Completeness: Adequate attention to all aspects of a medical problem, including prevention, early detection, diagnosis, treatment, follow-up measures, and rehabilitation.
• Comprehensiveness: Care is provided for all types of health problems.
• Continuity: Management of a patient's care over time is coordinated among providers.

Community Participation

• Meaningful involvement of the community in planning, implementation, and maintenance of health services.
• Maximum reliance on local resources such as manpower, money, and materials.

Essential Services

• Needed and important for improving the health status of the community.
• Cannot go without, e.g., immunization.

Primary Care vs. Health Care

• Primary care is not primary health care alone, but the organization of a full range of health care, from home to hospital, with prevention as equally important as cure.
• Medical care is personal services provided by physicians, while health care is services provided to individuals or communities by health professionals, promoting, maintaining, and restoring health.

Goal of Health Care System

• To provide the best possible health services for everyone, everywhere in the district, assuring adequate access to quality care at a reasonable price (equity of provision and equity in utilization of services).
• Achieving better health care for all is the goal of public health programs.