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"Primary health care is essential health care based on practical, scientifically sound and socially acceptable methods and technology made universally accessible to individuals and families in the community through their full participation and at a cost that the community and the country can afford to maintain at ever stage of their development in the spirit of self-determination" The approach has also been called as "Health by the people" and "placing people's health in people's hands". Primary health care was accepted by the member countries of WHO as the key to achieving the goal of Health For All . ESSENTIAL COMPONENTS OF PRIMARY HEALTH CARE The Declaration of Alma Ata outlined the 8 essential components of primary health care. 1. Education concerning prevailing health problems and the methods of preventing and controlling them. 2. Promotion of Food Supply and proper Nutrition . 3. An adequate supply of safe Water and basic Sanitation . 4. Maternal and child health care, including Family Planning . 5. Immunisation against major Infectious Diseases . 6. Prevention and control of locally Endemic disaeses. 7. Appropriate treatment of common Diseases and Injuries . 8. Provision of Essential Drugs . PRINCIPLES OF PRIMARY HEALTH CARE Equitable distribution Health services must be shared equally by all people irrespective of their ability to pay. Community participation There must be a continuing effort to secure meaningful involvement of the community in the Planning , Implementation and Maintenance of health services, beside maximum reliance on local resources such as Manpower , Money and materials. Intersectoral coordination Primary health care involves in addition to the health sector, all related sectors and aspects of national and community development, in particular Agriculture , Animal Husbandry , Food , Industry , Education , Housing , public works, Communication and other sectors. Australian Application of Professor John Joseph Macdonald is the foundation chair of Primary Health Care, at the University of Western Sydney Appropriate technology Appropriate Technology is technology that is Scientifically sound, adaptable to local needs, acceptable to those who apply it and for those for whom it is used and can be maintained by the people themselves in keeping with the principle of Self Reliance with the Resources the community and country can afford. SEE ALSO REFERENCES WHO (1978). Alma Ata 1978: Primary Health Care, HFA Sr. No. 1 |