Primary Care In Practice

The development of the Chronic Care Model (CCM) for the care of patients with chronic diseases has focused on the integration of taking charge of the patient and his family within primary care. The major critical issues in the implementation of the CCM principles are the non-application of the best practices, defined by EBM guidelines, the lack of care coordination and active follow-up of clinical outcomes, and by inadequately trained patients, who are unable to manage their illnesses. This book focuses on these points: the value of an integrated approach to some chronic conditions, the value of the care coordination across the continuum of the illness, the importance of an evidence-based management, and the enormous value of the patients involvement in the struggle against their conditions, without forgetting the essential role of the caregivers and the community when the diseases become profoundly disabling.

General practitioners and other primary care professionals have a leading role in contemporary health care, which Trisha Greenhalgh explores in this highly praised new text. She provides perceptive and engaging insights into primary health care, focussing on: its intellectual roots its impact on the individual, the family and the community the role of the multidisciplinary team contemporary topics such as homelessness, ethnic health and electronic records. Concise summaries, highlighted boxes, extensive referencing and a dedicated section on effective learning make this essential reading for postgraduate students, tutors and researchers in primary care. "Trish Greenhalgh, in her frequent columns in the British Medical Journal...more than any other medical journalist spoke to her fellow GPs in the language of experience, but never without linking this to our expanding knowledge from the whole of human science. When I compare the outlines of primary care so lucidly presented in this wonderful book, obviously derived from rich experience of real teaching and learning, with the grand guignol theatre of London medical schools when I was a student 1947-52, the advance is stunning." —From the foreword by Julian Tudor Hart "Trish Greenhalgh is one of the international stars of general practice and a very clever thinker. This new book is a wonderful resource for primary health care and general practice. Every general practice registrar should read this book and so should every general practice teacher and primary care researcher." —Professor Michael Kidd, Head of the Department of General Practice, University of Sydney and Immediate Past President of The Royal Australian College of General Practitioners "This important new book by one of primary care's most accomplished authors sets out clearly the academic basis for further developments in primary health care. Health systems will only function effectively if they recognise the importance of high quality primary care so I strongly recommend this book to students, teachers, researchers, practitioners and policy makers." —Professor Martin Marshall, Deputy Chief Medical Officer, Department of Health, UK

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.

This practical ‘How To’ guide talks the reader step-by-step through designing, conducting and disseminating primary care research, a growing discipline internationally. The vast majority of health care issues are experienced by people in community settings, who are not adequately represented by hospital-based research. There is therefore a great need to upskill family physicians and other primary care workers and academics to conduct community-based research to inform best practice. Aimed at emerging researchers, including those in developing countries, this book also addresses cutting edge and newly developing research methods, which will be of equal interest to more experienced researchers.

This is the first book to analyze in depth the current causes of shortage of family physicians and the relative weakness of the family practice model in many countries in the Eastern Mediterranean Region. Focusing on engagement with the private health sector in scaling up family practice, the book explores why primary health care can make the difference and how it can be introduced and strengthened. Comparative experiences from around the world put the EMR in context, while the book also highlights where the EMR is special – in particular, the burden for health care of refugees and displaced persons, and the need of public-private partnerships.

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.