Posts Tagged ‘prevention’
Tuesday, February 9, 2010
Public Health: improving health, preventing disease, and reducing health care costs for all
By Kristina Diamond, Policy Director, New Hampshire Public Health Association
The mission of the New Hampshire Public Health Association (NHPHA) is to strengthen the public health system to more effectively protect and improve the health and safety of our population. Many people don’t realize that public health initiatives help improve health, prevent disease and reduce health care costs for all. Our current health care system isn’t working and we need to fix it. With the uncertainty now of whether national health reform will pass, we must take the opportunity to not only educate the public, but also NH policymakers on the importance of integrating prevention and wellness into all aspects of our lives.
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Tuesday, October 13, 2009
Greater than the Sum of the Parts: Creating an integrated health care system.
By Laura Davie, UNH Institute for Health Policy & Practice
When we look at the factors that affect our health we find that the most important factor is behavior (which accounts for 50% of health outcomes). That is followed by Environment (20%), Heredity (20%), and finally use of the Health System (10%). The stunning fact in light of these realities is that we spend 90% of our health care resources on medical care. We are a country that consumes twice the Gross National Product of all the industrialized countries on Health Care, yet leaves 20% of our citizens without coverage. This system does not support developing a healthy population. It is expensive, increasingly exclusive, and focuses on the treatment of illness rather than the improvement of health.
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