Primary health care and continuous quality improvement

For most people, the main point of access to the health system is through primary health care (PHC). The fundamental premise of primary health care is that all people, everywhere, have the right to receive the appropriate care in their community. Primary health care attends to the majority of a person's health needs throughout their lifetime, including physical, mental and social wellbeing. PHC is people-centred rather than disease-centred. It is a whole-of-society approach that includes health promotion, disease prevention, treatment, rehabilitation and palliative care.

Primary health care and continuous quality improvement: An evidence-based guide provides an accessible contemporary guide on implementing continuous quality improvement (CQI) in PHC settings. The authors draw together two decades of practical experience and established leadership in Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander health in Australia to provide guidance for health services and their staff, policymakers, researchers, funders and support organisations in an international context.

Primary health care and continuous quality improvement provides an in-depth understanding of how CQI can be used to strengthen health systems by:

- identifying core concepts underpinning CQI in PHC and how CQI can improve health care quality, health equity and population health;

- explaining how CQI data is used in a comprehensive approach to PHC to measure quality, and how data is generated and used for improving care;

- describing CQI tools and techniques used by PHC teams;

- offering guidance in interpreting data and addressing variation in care quality;

- providing case studies in maternal health, children's health, mental health and other areas, to describe the application of CQI to improve clinical care;

- guiding practitioners on how to collaborate and build data systems for CQI, and strengthen links between communities and PHC services.

Continuous quality improvement is everybody's business, and Primary health care and continuous quality improvement explains the strategic use of CQI at different levels of the health system and across sectors to achieve and sustain large-scale health improvement.