Over half the world's rural population, and many in urban slums, have minimal access to health services. This book describes how to set up new, and develop existing, community-based health care for, by and with, the community.

How do communities protect and improve the health of their populations? Health care is part of the answer but so are environmental protections, social and educational services, adequate nutrition, and a host of other activities. With concern over funding constraints, making sure such activities are efficient and effective is becoming a high priority. Improving Health in the Community explains how population-based performance monitoring programs can help communities point their efforts in the right direction. Within a broad definition of community health, the committee addresses factors surrounding the implementation of performance monitoring and explores the "why" and "how to" of establishing mechanisms to monitor the performance of those who can influence community health. The book offers a policy framework, applies a multidimensional model of the determinants of health, and provides sets of prototype performance indicators for specific health issues. Improving Health in the Community presents an attainable vision of a process that can achieve community-wide health benefits.

The anthrax incidents following the 9/11 terrorist attacks put the spotlight on the nation's public health agencies, placing it under an unprecedented scrutiny that added new dimensions to the complex issues considered in this report. The Future of the Public's Health in the 21st Century reaffirms the vision of Healthy People 2010, and outlines a systems approach to assuring the nation's health in practice, research, and policy. This approach focuses on joining the unique resources and perspectives of diverse sectors and entities and challenges these groups to work in a concerted, strategic way to promote and protect the public's health. Focusing on diverse partnerships as the framework for public health, the book discusses: The need for a shift from an individual to a population-based approach in practice, research, policy, and community engagement. The status of the governmental public health infrastructure and what needs to be improved, including its interface with the health care delivery system. The roles nongovernment actors, such as academia, business, local communities and the media can play in creating a healthy nation. Providing an accessible analysis, this book will be important to public health policy-makers and practitioners, business and community leaders, health advocates, educators and journalists.

There have always been homeless people in the United States, but their plight has only recently stirred widespread public reaction and concern. Part of this new recognition stems from the problem's prevalence: the number of homeless individuals, while hard to pin down exactly, is rising. In light of this, Congress asked the Institute of Medicine to find out whether existing health care programs were ignoring the homeless or delivering care to them inefficiently. This book is the report prepared by a committee of experts who examined these problems through visits to city slums and impoverished rural areas, and through an analysis of papers written by leading scholars in the field.

An approachable and robust treatment of designing and planning spaces for use in healthcare settings In Healthcare Design Basics, a team of distinguished interior architecture practitioners and educators delivers an up-to-date text covering the critical aspects of healthcare design, preparing students for a specialty rapidly growing in importance and size. The book adopts an approach designed to crystalize the most important elements of broad range of ambulatory facilities for healthcare design students and new professionals in a clear, concise, and approachable way. The authors combine a broad overview of numerous ambulatory healthcare typologies with exercises that allow students to prepare detailed plans for many of the most commonly used rooms in the healthcare industry, thus preparing them for the demands of professional positions. Readers will also find: A step-by-step studio companion outlining the basic design elements required for a wide range of ambulatory healthcare facilities and rooms Comprehensive explorations of the demands of new and improved healthcare facilities that meet the needs of an aging population Practical discussions of the space planning challenges involved in designing rooms and facilities for use during public health crises, including pandemics 60 full-color images that illustrate and highlight important concepts, examples, and design solutions Written for students of interior design, architecture, and emerging professionals, Healthcare Design Basics also benefits professionals tasked with the initial planning and design of ambulatory facilities, and other healthcare settings.