PHC Connect

Building Capacity for Primary Health Care

Overview

Primary and community health services play a pivotal role in the health system and is the part of the health system where most people receive most of their health care, most of the time. There is compelling international evidence from the research done by people such as Barbara Starfield, James Macinko, Leiyu Shi and others that primary care has an independent effect on improving health status and reducing health inequalities and that countries with well developed primary care systems have healthier populations and reduced health care costs.

In response to these findings, health systems around the world are reforming and developing their primary health care sector. In Australia this is happening at both national and state level. The focus of these reforms is strengthening general practice and supporting their collaboration with other parts of the health system, as well as strengthening community health services through clarifying their functions and contributions to meeting key policy priorities, developing new models of care and service delivery including integration with general practice, and building capacity though better information management systems. A key priority is also to build the evidence base through a national primary health care research agenda.

"A strong primary health care sector is central to the success and sustainability of our health system." (National Primary Health Care Strategy 2004)