Navigating General Healthcare Services for Better Health

Services and practices aimed at maintaining or improving health via prevention and treatment.

General Healthcare FAQ

What does health care mean?

Pictured is its Weill Cornell facility (white complex at the center). Health care, or healthcare, is the improvement of health via the prevention, diagnosis, treatment, amelioration or cure of disease, illness, injury, and other physical and mental impairments in people. Health care is delivered by health professionals and allied health fields.

What is a general health measure?

This measure of general health differs from the Office for National Statistics (ONS) Health Index, which uses a broad definition of health, including health outcomes, health-related behaviours and personal circumstances and wider drivers of health.

What is primary health care?

addressing the broader determinants of health through multisectoral policy and action empowering individuals, families and communities to take charge of their own health. Primary health care enables health systems to support a person’s health needs – from health promotion to disease prevention, treatment, rehabilitation, palliative care and more.

Who delivers health care?

Health care is delivered by health professionals and allied health fields. Medicine, dentistry, pharmacy, midwifery, nursing, optometry, audiology, psychology, occupational therapy, physical therapy, athletic training, and other health professions all constitute health care.

What is a general health status indicator?

Unlike simple indicators based on the presence or absence of disease, an important property of the general health status indicator is that it includes the entire spectrum of health states ranging from ‘Good’ to ‘Not good’ health.

What is a health index?

The Health Index provides a single value for health that can show how health changes over time using broader considerations than the general health self-assessment. In 2001, each person in a household was asked to rate their general health over the last 12 months as good, fairly good, or not good.

Does understanding health information affect a person's ability to manage their own health?

Research shows the impact of understanding health information on a person’s capacity to manage their own health. One study looked at commonly used resources for people with the bone condition, osteoporosis. Researchers found unnecessary technical language and concluded that most of the information was too complex for people to understand.