The Importance Of Comprehensive Care

Introduction
The implementation of health care has effectively evolved into a triad of sequential tiers of service delivery : primary, secondary and tertiary levels of health care. For healthcare delivery to be effective there had be a shift in the emphasis of undergraduate tuition to promote a comprehensive approach to healthcare provision the efficacy of which is dependant on interdisciplinary cooperation. With the aforementioned in mind, I reflected on the role I could play in the provision of effective health for all.

Comprehensive Care
I would define comprehensive healthcare as the co-ordinated provision of legislated services to promote health, prevent harm and disease, cure presenting ailments and to rehabilitate patients back into

The first two aspects of comprehensive care is that of health promotion (Promotive Care) and disease prevention (Preventative Care). Health promotion makes use of strategies that encourage good health practices e.g. sanitation, nutrition etc. (Alperstein, 2007). Disease prevention makes use of strategies that will stop the disease from starting e.g. vaccinations, education related to reducing practices that spread diseases etc. Preventative health should also include the promotion of protective clothing such as hard hats on building sites to prevent potential physical injury. It should be noted that often there’s difficulty in understanding the difference between promotive and preventative care. According to Alperstein (2009:16) preventative care often only looks at different methods to prevent specific diseases, whilst health promotion has a broader approach and focuses on rather changing the environment and people’s behaviour in order to improve health. (Alperstein, 2009:

This naturally implied that this professional had to fulfil all the roles outlined . This example outlines the importance of managerial skills as a doctor. Alperstein (2009:13) defines a doctor’s role as “Doctors are trained to prevent, diagnose and treat all conditions”. This places emphasis on the prevention, diagnosis, and treatment but this definition should now be extended to include palliative care and rehabilitation. In addition, this service should be rendered with a social conscience in order to fit into the contemporary definition of Comprehensive healthcare. (Alperstein, 2009:13)
Obviously, it will be advantageous for the professional to possess adequate managerial skills in order to be effective in fulfilling these functions. These skills will assist in decision making based on pragmatism, and promote information exchange that will facilitate the functioning of the doctor in a multi-professional