Primary Care Centers

Ask for a definition of primary care, and you are likely to hear as many answers as there are health care professionals in your survey. Primary Care fills this gap with a detailed definition already adopted by professional organizations and praised at recent conferences. This volume makes recommendations for improving primary care, building its organization, financing, infrastructure, and knowledge baseâ€"as well as developing a way of thinking and acting for primary care clinicians. Are there enough primary care doctors? Are they merely gatekeepers? Is the traditional relationship between patient and doctor outmoded? The committee draws conclusions about these and other controversies in a comprehensive and up-to-date discussion that covers: The scope of primary care. Its philosophical underpinnings. Its value to the patient and the community. Its impact on cost, access, and quality. This volume discusses the needs of special populations, the role of the capitation method of payment, and more. Recommendations are offered for achieving a more multidisciplinary education for primary care clinicians. Research priorities are identified. Primary Care provides a forward-thinking view of primary care as it should be practiced in the new integrated health care delivery systemsâ€"important to health care clinicians and those who train and employ them, policymakers at all levels, health care managers, payers, and interested individuals.

Health care is constantly undergoing change and refinement resulting from the adoption of new practices and technologies, the changing nature of societies and populations, and also shifts in the very places from which care is delivered. Primary Health Care: People, Practice, Place draws together significant contributions from established experts across a variety of disciplines to focus on such changes in primary health care, not only because it is the most basic and integral form of health service delivery, but also because it is an area to which geographers have made significant contributions and to which other scholars have engaged in 'thinking geographically' about its core concepts and issues. Including perspectives from both consumers and producers, it moves beyond geographical accounts of the context of health service provision through its explicit focus on the practice of primary health care. With arguments well-supported by empirical research, this book will appeal not only to scholars across a range of social and health sciences, but also to professionals involved in health services.

Ensuring that members of society are healthy and reaching their full potential requires the prevention of disease and injury; the promotion of health and well-being; the assurance of conditions in which people can be healthy; and the provision of timely, effective, and coordinated health care. Achieving substantial and lasting improvements in population health will require a concerted effort from all these entities, aligned with a common goal. The Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA) and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) requested that the Institute of Medicine (IOM) examine the integration of primary care and public health. Primary Care and Public Health identifies the best examples of effective public health and primary care integration and the factors that promote and sustain these efforts, examines ways by which HRSA and CDC can use provisions of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act to promote the integration of primary care and public health, and discusses how HRSA-supported primary care systems and state and local public health departments can effectively integrate and coordinate to improve efforts directed at disease prevention. This report is essential for all health care centers and providers, state and local policy makers, educators, government agencies, and the public for learning how to integrate and improve population health.

This issue of Primary Care: Clinics in Office Practice, guest edited by Dr. Benjamin Silverberg, is devoted to Adolescent Medicine. Articles in this issue include: Disorders of Puberty; Adolescent Vaccines; School-based Health Care; Musculoskeletal Issues in Adolescents; Gender Non-conforming Health Care in Adolescents; Refugee and Immigrant Health Care in Adolescents; Human Trafficking in Adolescents; Crisis Counseling for Adolescents; Sexual Assault in Adolescents; HIV (PrEP, PEP, chronic care) in Adolescents; Sexually Transmitted Infections in Adolescents; Substance Misuse and Addiction in Adolescents; and Headaches in Adolescents.

Low back pain is one of the most common problems and leading causes of disability. This issue of Primary Care Clinics in Office Practice focuses on the burden of low back pain from diagnosis to treatment options and prevention with topics that include: surgical intervention, disability and low back pain: evaluation and determination, complementary and alternative medicine treatments, and interventional and non-interventional treatment of low back pain.

Guest edited by Drs Fern R. Hauck and Carina Brown, this issue of Primary Care: Clinics in Office Practice will cover several key areas of interest related to Immigrant Health. This issue is one of four selected each year by our series Consulting Editor, Dr. Joel J. Heidelbaugh. Articles in this issue include but are not limited to: Caring for the Forcibly Displaced, Refugee Medical Screening, Effective Communication with Refugees and Immigrants, Cultural Considerations in Caring for Refugees and Immigrants, Common infectious diseases, Impact of COVID-19 on Resettled Refugees, Common hematologic, nutritional, asthma/allergic conditions and lead screening/management, Preventive care and management of chronic diseases in immigrant adults, Preventive care in children and adolescents, Women’s Health and Gender-Specific Considerations, Mental Health and Illness, Special Issues in Immigrant Medicine, Models of Care, and more.