HAP TEST 2 (Chapter 7)

Is reached when an individual’s total health care needs are coordinated to ensure continuing and comprehensive health care.

Is the care coordination role of a primary care practitioner. It implies that patients do not visit specialists without referral from the primary care physician, who functions as the gatekeeper. It is not designed to be a controlling mechanism to deny people necessary care. Gatekeeping lowers costs by eliminating unnecessary trips to specialists and incurring higher prescription costs as well as health assessment expenses. Gatekeeping is very important to primary care because of the ability to lower cost by also is in place to improve or upgrade our primary care services, more comprehensive.

Refers to a cluster of comprehensive services that address the special needs of the dying persons and their families. It blends medical, spiritual, legal, financial, and family-support services. Services are taken to patients and their families wherever they happen to be located.

Is the measure of death rate. Studies show a relationship between primary care physician supply and mortality outcomes, where increases in the supply of primary care physicians are associated with decreased in overall and cause-specific population mortality rates.

Is essential health care that constitutes the first level of contact by a patient with the health delivery system and the first element of a continuing healthcare process

Refers to actions designed to reduce the odds that a disease will subsequently develop. Its objective is to restrain the development of a disease or negative health condition before it occurs. Smoking cessation, prenatal care, hand washing, and refrigeration of foods are examples of primary prevention.

refers to early diagnosis and treatment of disease. Health screening plays a key role in secondary prevention. The objective is to b lock the progression of disease

Constitutes the most complex level of care. Typically, tertiary care is institution based, highly specialized, and highly technological. Examples include burn treatment, transplantation, and coronary artery bypass surgery

Outpatient care refers to any health care services that do not require an overnight stay in an institution of health care delivery, such as a hospital or long-term care facility. It includes much more than primary care services. Reimbursement, technological factors, utilization control factors and social factors are several key changes have been instrumental in shifting the balance between inpatient and outpatient services. In regards to reimbursement, both private and public payers have a clear preference for outpatient treatment because it costs less than inpatient care. Technological factors include the development of new diagnostic and treatment procedures and less invasive surgical methods that have made it possible to provide services in outpatient settings that previously had required inpatient stays in hospitals. One of the social factors creating this shift is when patients generally have a strong preference for receiving health care in home and community-based settings.

Primary care is the point of entry into the health services system where health care delivery is organized around primary care. Primary care is the first contact a patient makes with the health delivery system. Referrals for specialized services are made by primary care physicians. One of the main functions of primary care is to coordinate the delivery of health services between the patient and the myriad delivery components of the system. Hence, in addition to providing basic services, primary care professionals serve the role of patient advisor, advocate, and system gatekeeper. In this coordinating role, the provider refers patients to sources of specialized care, gives advice regarding various diagnoses and therapies, discusses treatment options, and provides continuing care over time. Coordination of an individual's total health care needs is meant to ensure continuity and comprehensiveness. Primary care is comprehensive because it addresses any health problem at any given stage of a patient's life cycle. Primary health care is regarded as essential health care. As such, the goal of the health delivery system is to optimize population health, not just the health of individuals who have the means to access health services. Achievement of this goal requires that disparities across population subgroups be minimized to ensure equal access.

A combination of community health centers and church health centers serve as safety nets for individuals who lack private or public health insurances. These free clinics have three main characteristics: (1) services are provided at no charge or at a very nominal charge, (2) the clinics are not directly supported or operated by a government agency or health department, and (3) services are delivered mainly by trained volunteer staff.

• The supply of primary care physicians dropped sharply between 1949 and 1970 and has been on a slow decline path since then
• According to the 1999 data from the American Medical Association, about 65.5% of doctors were specialists while 34.5% were generalists.