Population health has been defined as “the health outcomes of a group of individuals, including the distribution of such outcomes within the group.” It is an approach to health that aims to improve the health of an entire population. One major step in achieving this aim is to reduce health inequities among population groups. Population health seeks to step beyond the individual-level focus of mainstream medicine and to complement the organized efforts of public health by addressing a broader range of factors that impact health on a population-level, such as environment, social structure, resource distribution, etc. One important theme in population health is the importance of social determinants of health and the relatively minor impact that medicine and healthcare have on improving health overall.
From a population health perspective, health has been defined not simply as a state free from disease but as "the capacity of people to adapt to, respond to, or control life's challenges and changes".
Read more about Population Health: The Role of Economic Inequality, The Importance of Family Planning Programs, Population Health Management (PHM), See Also
Famous quotes containing the words population and/or health:
“We in the West do not refrain from childbirth because we are concerned about the population explosion or because we feel we cannot afford children, but because we do not like children.”
—Germaine Greer (b. 1939)
“Some fear that if parents start listening to their own wants and needs they will neglect their children. It is our belief that children are in fact far less likely to be neglected when their parents’ needs—for support, for friendship, for decent work, for health care, for learning, for play, for time alone—are being met.”
—Wendy Coppedge Sanford. Ourselves and Our Children, by Boston Women’s Health Book Collective, introduction (1978)