Primary health care

Primary health care is about health at all ages. It involves prevention, health promotion, treatment, rehabilitation and palliation. This approach empowers people and communities to choose healthier lifestyles, prevent diseases, and access early detection, treatment and recovery services.

Primary health care is not about building specific health facilities. It is an overall approach to strengthening national health systems to respond to people’s essential health needs more effectively.

Primary health care goes beyond primary care, which is a subset of primary health care and refers to essential, first-contact care provided in a community setting such as community health posts. It ensures that people receive support closer to their everyday environments and are referred to secondary or tertiary care facilities, including hospitals, when the need arises.

Primary health care encompasses 3 aspects: multisectoral policy and action to address the broader determinants of health; empowering individuals, families and communities; and meeting people’s essential health needs throughout their lives. 

The world has committed to making health for all a reality and primary health care is one of the best tools we have for achieving that goal.

There is a growing body of evidence in countries that support economic arguments in favour of increasing investment in primary health care. It has been proven that health systems with a primary health care-based foundation result in

• improved clinical outcomes
• increased efficiency
• better quality of care
• enhanced patient satisfaction.

Through the Declaration of Astana, countries have reaffirmed the importance of primary health care. While many governments have been working to turn their commitments into action on the ground, in recent decades, primary health care has been neglected in many countries in favour of disease-specific approaches. Misperceptions of the role and benefits of primary health care, in combination with of lack of political will, are often seen as the cause of under investment.

No. Primary health care is an approach to health system strengthening that can work effectively in both high and low-resource settings. While it makes health services more accessible to communities, it also strengthens the referral system between primary care facilities and secondary or tertiary care, including hospitals.

Primary health care provides essential care that can cover the majority of people’s health needs throughout their lives. Because primary health care focuses on the person rather than the disease, it is an approach that moves away from overspecialization. Its goal is to work through multidisciplinary teams with strong referral systems to secondary and tertiary care when needed.

Primary health care is about health at all ages. It involves prevention, health promotion, treatment, rehabilitation and palliation. This approach empowers people and communities to choose healthier lifestyles, prevent diseases, access early detection, treatment and recovery services.