The role of primary health care is to serve as the first line of defense against illness and disease. "Primary health care plays a central role in health care systems worldwide," states the Disease Control Priorities Project. "It can offer families cost-effective services close to home, eliminating trips to specialists and hospitals."
Purposes of Primary Health Care
Some of the purposes of primary health care include: serving local communities; handling a wide range of basic health care needs; allowing patients to be treated by the same primary care providers; coordinating basic care services with specialized care whenever necessary; and providing health care services to poor and underserved groups that would otherwise lack access to decent health care.
Basic Services Commonly Provided by Primary Health Care
A basic primary health care list of services include: maternity and family planning; childhood immunizations and treatment for childhood illnesses; and prevention, treatment, and control of diseases such as tuberculosis and malaria. Increasingly, treatment for HIV/AIDS is becoming a part of basic primary health care in many countries.
Benefits of Primary Health Care
According to the the Disease Control Priority Project, primary health care reduces disease by addressing the health care of children, including prevention and treatment. It reduces the economic costs of ill health; assures medical coverage for poor people, a group most in need of it; reduces the use of emergency and hospital visits; facilitates the control of routine illnesses; and increases patient compliance and acceptance of medical treatments.
Issues in Providing Primary Health Care
Providing primary health care is a challenge in many countries. A lack of money, trained doctors, and too few drugs combined with poor equipment prevents many primary health care systems from functioning to full capability.
A "USA Today" article on August 8, 2010, discussed the shortage of primary doctors in America. It is estimated that about 65 million people live in communities that have a shortage of primary care doctors. In part, it's because doctors who specialize instead of providing primary care make a lot more money.
In 2008, the American Association of Medical Colleges estimated a shortfall of 48,000 primary care doctors in the U.S. by 2025, in part because the 2010 health care bill will provide medical coverage for an additional 35 million Americans who presently lack health insurance.
Innovations in Primary Health Care
With so much demand for primary health care, the medical community is attempting to meet the need with a variety of innovative programs. One such program in Portland, Oregon, charges patients a yearly flat fee for coverage. Another community program on the East Coast schedules group appointments with 6 to 14 patients. And some medical schoolsoffer incentives for students to become primary care physicians.
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