World Health Organization Publication : Year 2002 - Summary Mueasures of Population Health : Concepts, Ethics, Measurement and Applications, Chapter 2.2: Chapter 2 ; on the Uses of Summary Measures of Population Health

By Michael C. Wolfson

Book Id: WPLBN0000163754
Format Type: PDF eBook
File Size: 0.1 MB
Reproduction Date: 2005

Title:	World Health Organization Publication : Year 2002 - Summary Mueasures of Population Health : Concepts, Ethics, Measurement and Applications, Chapter 2.2: Chapter 2 ; on the Uses of Summary Measures of Population Health
Author:	Michael C. Wolfson
Volume:
Language:	English
Subject:	Health., Public health, Wellness programs
Collections:	Medical Library Collection, World Health Collection
Historic Publication Date:
Publisher:	World Health Organization


Citation APA MLA Chicago Wolfson, M. C. (n.d.). World Health Organization Publication : Year 2002 - Summary Mueasures of Population Health : Concepts, Ethics, Measurement and Applications, Chapter 2.2. Retrieved from http://self.gutenberg.org/

Description
Medical Reference Publication

Excerpt
Introduction By far, the most fundamental use of summary measures of population health (SMPH) is to shift the centre of gravity of health policy discourse away from the inputs (e.g. costs, human resources, and new technologies) and throughputs (e.g. how many surgical procedures) of the health system towards health outcomes for the population.1 This is not to imply that the resources used and activities undertaken by national or regional health systems are unimportant; quite the contrary. But our understanding of their roles and importance is more appropriate if guided by the real “bottom line”, namely their influence on population health. In parallel to this applied use, SMPH can also play a fundamental role in helping to define the agenda and priorities for health research. Ideally, SMPH, and their underlying statistical systems, can be used to highlight the relative burdens experienced by a nation’s or community’s members attributable to various sorts of health problems or causes. These basic roles for SMPH beg several key questions about how they ought to be constructed and presented. I shall comment briefly on these questions in turn.

Table of Contents
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