Many players in the health field have varying degree of definition and explanation of what Primary Health Care is over the years. One to fall on in my deliberation here is a definition put together by these two world bodies- the World Health Organization and the United Nation Children’s Fund as penned below;
Primary Health Care is a whole-society approach to health that aims at ensuring the highest possible level of health and well-being and their equitable distribution by focusing on people’s needs and 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.
The question then is, why do we have a system in place that makes it easier for people to lose lives, livelihood or breadwinners to health problems easily preventable? Why do we spend so much resources on a health care system that seeks to solve health problems, when clearly, there is opportunity to invest in an alternative that could prevent problems or reduce the possibility of more serious problems? Can we develop this alternative alongside costly and mostly less effective secondary system of healthcare delivery we have here in Ghana, and I believe in many other countries? Certainly yes! A better alternative is Primary Healthcare.
Primary health care is the best form of healthcare in the world and it’s adopted and effectively implemented by nations rated to have the best healthcare system. The irony is that, it is relatively less expensive to implement.
Prevention and Maintenance
Back to the definition of Primary health care; the first practical meaning is that primary healthcare is mainly about disease prevention, early treatment of illnesses and overall health maintenance; that is the true essence of this healthcare module.
We as humans are better placed to prevent a lot of unfortunate incidences long before they happen. One of such is health problem. Many diseases are directly linked to an individual’s choice of lifestyle and it requires deliberate steps to prevent them. Daily activities such as the food we eat, the water and beverages we take in, rest or sleep habit, physical activities etc. have direct influence on the kind of diseases one may be at risk of suffering from.
When we fail to put in place measures to ensure ill-health is identified and treated early at the minor stage, we ostensibly put in place structures, where people have to get diseases otherwise easily preventable. It can be costly to cure diseases and financial cost is just one of them. Many diseases cannot be cured completely, there is only an opportunity to manage them properly almost for life.
I see too many patients taken home from hospital ward against medical advice; just because he nor the family cannot afford treatment.
Sickness is inevitable, even the most health-conscious individual at a point could get in trouble with ill-health. I often tell my audience, diseases in the body progress in stages. A disease that occurs in the body and overwhelmed the natural defense (immune system) does not go away on its own. So, one cannot wish away an illness without doing anything about it.
A Whole Society Approach
Another important point worth noting in the definition of P.H.C. is that, it involves a whole-society approach. To achieve the practical meaning of PHC in any big sense, the general public must be actively involved. The recipient of this type of healthcare-the general public cannot be sidelined as mere clients. They ought to be regarded the most important partners because that’s exactly what they are and they have a central role to play if we are to achieve an effective working primary health care system.
Unlike secondary or tertiary healthcare service which requires well equipped facility including highly trained professionals, primary healthcare services do not require such expensive establishment because it involves entire society at basic levels of healthcare, playing various roles geared towards maintaining the highest health status.
In light of this, one can say the society or the home itself forms part of the ‘edifice’ of P.H.C. Unlike secondary healthcare setting where doctors, nurses and other allied health staff are easily considered frontliners, the community or the people ought to be at the fore-front for a successful effective primary healthcare. For secondary healthcare, many people are forced to visit health facilities because of the suffering an existing health problem is putting them through. Unfortunately, that is largely the health culture in Ghana.
Highest Level of Healthcare
One of important points in the definition of primary healthcare is that, it’s the highest possible level of health-care and well-being. One may arguably refer to sophisticated medical treatments available at the secondary or tertiary level as the highest form of healthcare. But consider it this way; a system that frequently monitors and seeks to prevent disease and its complications or maintain overall good health by focusing on the factors that make people sick and eliminate/mitigate them; another seeks to take out existing health problem or correct the harms of diseases, which is more preferable?
No matter how best a hospital is rated in terms of its services, no one enjoys spending days on hospital bed with the hope of getting well again. In some cases, treatment is not without some serious risk of bad outcome. Everyone would love to live and enjoy life in excellent health and that is what primary healthcare is all about through health promotion, disease prevention and protection against disease complications.
Equitable Distribution of Health
The last but not the least point in the definition is that, P.H.C. makes equitable distribution of healthcare delivery possible. This type of healthcare approach, bridges the wide gap that often exists between the rich and poor, when it comes to the delivery and accessibility of secondary/tertiary healthcare. This assertion can be true because the basic nature of P.H.C. service makes affordability, accessibility almost the same irrespective of one’s economic standing. At the same time, offering the highest health benefit for all. For instance, physical fitness is a vital tool of an effective preventive or primary healthcare. The rich man who understands its significance pays and regularly visits the gym, the one who cannot afford does not need to pay any money for gym service; he only has to hit the road for a run or jogging. In this situation, they both would achieve the same great result. With this, the burden does not lie in financial constraint but rather helping everyone (rich and poor) to understand the importance of making body fitness a habit.
