Health reforms that emphasize public health and improvements in primary care can be cost-effective measures to achieve health improvements, especially in developing countries that face severe resource constraints. In their paper “Shanghai rising: health improvements as measured by avoidable mortality since 2000,” Gusmano et al suggest that Shanghai’s health policy-makers have been successful in...

introduction: primary care organizations are the entities through which clinical governance is developed at local level. to implement clinical governance in primary care, awareness about principles, prerequisites and barriers of this quality improvement paradigm is necessary. the aim of this study is to pool evidence about implementing clinical governance in primary care organizations. data sou...

BACKGROUND Consumer e-Health is a potential solution to the problems of accessibility, quality and costs of delivering public healthcare services to patients. Although consumer e-Health has proliferated in recent years, it remains unclear if patients are willing and able to accept and use this new and rapidly developing technology. Therefore, the aim of this research is to study the factors inf...

Health systems organized in health care networks and coordinated by Primary Health Care can contribute to an improvement in clinical quality with a positive impact on health outcomes and user satisfaction (by improving access and resolubility) and a reduction in the costs of local health systems. Thus, the scope of this paper is to analyze the scientific output about the evidence, potential, ch...

Background and Objectives: While social network analysis has left a remarkable practical impact in the healthcare field, the potential implication of this methodology in the primary health domain is poorly researched. Hence, this study aimed to explore the use and usefulness social network analysis in the context of primary health care. Methods: The health volunteers of Imam Ali Health Center...

BACKGROUND The QUALICOPC (Quality and Costs of Primary Care in Europe) study aims to evaluate the performance of primary care systems in Europe in terms of quality, equity and costs. The study will provide an answer to the question what strong primary care systems entail and which effects primary care systems have on the performance of health care systems. QUALICOPC is funded by the European Co...

BACKGROUND Primary care mental health workers are a new role recently introduced into primary care in England to help manage patients with common mental health problems. AIM To explore the views of GPs, primary care teams and patients on the value and development of the new role of primary care mental health workers in practice. DESIGN OF STUDY Qualitative study. SETTING The Heart of Birm...

(More information is available at pcmh.ahrq.gov.) In 1996, the Institute of Medicine’s Committee on the Future of Primary Care observed that “primary care is the logical basis of an effective health care system....[P]rimary care is essential to reaching the objectives that constitute value in health care: high-quality care (including achieving desired outcomes), good patient satisfaction, and e...