What is Health? This means that health is a resource to support an individual’s function in wider society, rather than an end in itself. A healthful lifestyle provides the means to lead a full life with meaning and purpose.
What is Health care? Efforts made to maintain or restore physical, mental, or emotional well-being especially by trained and licensed professionals —usually hyphenated when used attributively
Types of Health Care: 1.Primary Health Care Primary care refers to the work of health professionals who act as a first point of consultation for all patients within the health care system.Such a professional would usually be a primary care physician, such as a general practitioner or family physician. Another professional would be a licensed independent practitioner such as a physiotherapist, or a non-physician primary care provider such as a physician assistant or nurse practitioner. Depending on the locality, health system organization the patient may see another health care professional first, such as a pharmacist or nurse.
Primary care involves the widest scope of health care, including all ages of patients, patients of all socioeconomic and geographic origins, patients seeking to maintain optimal health, and patients with all types of acute and chronic physical, mental and social health issues, including multiple chronic diseases. Consequently, a primary care practitioner must possess a wide breadth of knowledge in many areas. Continuity is a key characteristic of primary care, as patients usually prefer to consult the same practitioner for routine check-ups and preventive care, health education, and every time they require an initial consultation about a new health problem. The International Classification of Primary Care (ICPC) is a standardized tool for understanding and analyzing information on interventions in primary care based on the reason for the patient's visit.
2.Secondary Health Care Secondary care includes acute care: necessary treatment for a short period of time for a brief but serious illness, injury, or other health condition. This care is often found in a hospital emergency department. Secondary care also includes skilled attendance during childbirth, intensive care, and medical imaging services. The term "secondary care" is sometimes used synonymously with "hospital care". However, many secondary care providers, such as psychiatrists, clinical psychologists, occupational therapists, most dental specialties or physiotherapists, do not necessarily work in hospitals. Some primary care services are delivered within hospitals. Depending on the organization and policies of the national health system, patients may be required to see a primary care provider for a referral before they can access secondary care.
3.Tertiary Health Care Tertiary care is specialized consultative health care, usually for inpatients and on referral from a primary or secondary health professional, in a facility that has personnel and facilities for advanced medical investigation and treatment, such as a tertiary referral hospital. Examples of tertiary care services are cancer management, neurosurgery, cardiac surgery, plastic surgery, treatment for severe burns, advanced neonatology services, palliative, and other complex medical and surgical interventions.
4.Quaternary Health Care The term quaternary care is sometimes used as an extension of tertiary care in reference to advanced levels of medicine which are highly specialized and not widely accessed. Experimental medicine and some types of uncommon diagnostic or surgical procedures are considered quaternary care. These services are usually only offered in a limited number of regional or national health care centers.
5.Home and Community Health Care Many types of health care interventions are delivered outside of health facilities. They include many interventions of public health interest, such as food safety surveillance, distribution of condoms and needle-exchange programs for the prevention of transmissible diseases. They also include the services of professionals in residential and community settings in support of self-care, home care, long-term care, assisted living, treatment for substance use disorders among other types of health and social care services. Community rehabilitation services can assist with mobility and independence after the loss of limbs or loss of function. This can include prostheses, orthotics, or wheelchairs.
Health care financing There are generally five primary methods of funding health care systems:
General taxation to the state, county or municipality Social health insurance Voluntary or private health insurance Out-of-pocket payments Donations to health charities. In most countries, there is a mix of all five models, but this varies across countries and over time within countries. Aside from financing mechanisms, an important question should always be how much to spend on health care. For the purposes of comparison, this is often expressed as the percentage of GDP spent on health care. In OECD countries for every extra $1000 spent on health care, life expectancy falls by 0.4 years.A similar correlation is seen from the analysis carried out each year by Bloomberg.Clearly this kind of analysis is flawed in that life expectancy is only one measure of a health system's performance, but equally, the notion that more funding is better is not supported.
Why is Healthcare Important? Healthcare is amongst the one of the basic necessity’s required by an individual to stay fit in this world. It’s vital to ensure a healthy body as it leads to a healthy environment which will eventually lead to a healthy nation. To reach to their full potential, one should try to stay healthy and this can be achieved by having regular checkups, easier access to medical care if sick or injured in order to prevent further serious illness and, routinely vision and dental examinations. No one intends to get sick or hurt but everyone needs medical care at some point in their lives but since the recent escalating costs sadly not everyone can afford the required basic treatment, thus affecting them and the nation in the long run. US has state of the art medical care available but since the past 3 decades this country has faced a 60% price hike in the healthcare department forcing people who can’t afford it to either just wait their injuries or illness out, try cheaper home remedies and treatments noticeably not as effective, or borrow an enormous loan to pay the hospital bills and stay in forever debt affecting the quality of life and everyone surrounding the individual.
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