Primary health care (PHC) aims to ensure the highest level of health and well-being through a whole-of-society approach focused on meeting people's needs. PHC incorporates three interrelated components: comprehensive health services through primary care and public health; addressing broader social, economic, and environmental determinants of health across all sectors; and empowering communities to optimize their own health. PHC is based on principles of social justice, equity, and participation, recognizing access to health as a fundamental human right.
Primary health care (PHC) aims to ensure the highest level of health and well-being through a whole-of-society approach focused on meeting people's needs. PHC incorporates three interrelated components: comprehensive health services through primary care and public health; addressing broader social, economic, and environmental determinants of health across all sectors; and empowering communities to optimize their own health. PHC is based on principles of social justice, equity, and participation, recognizing access to health as a fundamental human right.
Primary health care (PHC) aims to ensure the highest level of health and well-being through a whole-of-society approach focused on meeting people's needs. PHC incorporates three interrelated components: comprehensive health services through primary care and public health; addressing broader social, economic, and environmental determinants of health across all sectors; and empowering communities to optimize their own health. PHC is based on principles of social justice, equity, and participation, recognizing access to health as a fundamental human right.
Primary health care (PHC) aims to ensure the highest level of health and well-being through a whole-of-society approach focused on meeting people's needs. PHC incorporates three interrelated components: comprehensive health services through primary care and public health; addressing broader social, economic, and environmental determinants of health across all sectors; and empowering communities to optimize their own health. PHC is based on principles of social justice, equity, and participation, recognizing access to health as a fundamental human right.
The concept of PHC has been repeatedly reinterpreted and redefined since 1978. In some contexts, PHC refers to the provision of ambulatory or first-contact personal health care services. In other contexts, it is understood as a set of priority health interventions for low-income populations (also called selective PHC). Some understand PHC as an essential component of human development, focusing on the economic, social and political aspects rather than simply health service provision. Each of these interpretations is a simplification of the broader definition set out in the Declaration of Alma-Ata, and their implementation carries the risk of missing out on the benefits of a comprehensive PHC approach. A clear and simple definition of PHC is needed to facilitate the coordination of future PHC efforts at the global, national, and local levels and to guide their implementation.
PHC is a whole-of-society approach to health that aims to ensure the highest possible level of health and well- being and their equitable distribution by focusing on people´s needs and preferences (as individuals, families, and communities) as early as possible along the continuum from health promotion and disease prevention to treatment, rehabilitation and palliative care, and as close as feasible to people’s everyday environment.
Fig. 1 The components of primary health care
The experience accumulated over the past 40 years supports a comprehensive definition of PHC, which incorporates three inter-related and synergistic components (Fig. 1).
1. Meeting people’s health needs through comprehensive promotive, protective, preventive, curative, rehabilitative, and palliative care throughout the life course, strategically prioritizing key health care services aimed at individuals and families through primary care and the population through public health functions as the central elements of integrated health services; 2. Systematically addressing the broader determinants of health (including social, economic and environmental factors, as well as individual characteristics and behaviour) through evidence-informed policies and actions across all sectors; and 3. Empowering individuals, families, and communities to optimize their health, as advocates for policies that promote and protect health and well-being, as co-developers of health and social services, and as self-carers and caregivers. PHC is rooted in a commitment to social justice, equity and participation. It is based on the recognition that the enjoyment of the highest attainable standard of health is one of the fundamental rights of every human being without distinction, as stated in the Constitution of the World Health Organization (6) and reinforced in article 25 of the Universal Declaration on Human Rights: “Everyone has the right to a standard of living adequate for the health and well-being of himself and of his family, including food, clothing, housing and medical care and necessary social services”(7). This underlines the responsibility of governments for making quality essential health services available and accessible and for implementing policies that promote and protect health and well-being. Numerous comparative analyses of health systems have demonstrated that PHC is the most equitable, efficient and effective strategy to enhance the health of populations. 2
