World Health Day: "75 years improving Public Health"
- Written by Lourdes Pichs Rodríguez
- Published in Health
- Hits: 1146
In the Manuel Díaz Legrá health area, in Holguín, the Provincial NCD Team together with other specialists in the implementation of the Heart Strategy Audit and Accident Surveillance System. Photos: Courtesy of the Education for Health Department
The World Health Day (WHD), held every year in April 7 since 1948 with the creation of the WHO, is celebrated under the slogan "75 years improving Public Health", based on the recognition of what has been done to improve the quality of life of the population in these more than seven decades.
The date is also a new occasion to devise objectives in order to achieve higher goals in favor of humanity; as well as to influence more in the Governments to achieve the necessary levels of health, years of life and well-being in general.
In Cuba, where the health system is based on primary care, a key idea is to continue improving the Family Doctor and Nurse Program from medical offices and the polyclinics network, through which universal medical coverage is guaranteed to the population in urban, rural and difficult-to-access communities, such as those located in the Turquino Plan.
Hence, an essential strategy of the National Health System is to continue promoting the transformation process in this plan, with the aim of increasing services, making them sustainable and ensuring that the population at the primary level satisfies more than 85 percent of their attention needs.
For this reason, promoting healthy lifestyles, risk prevention, treatment, rehabilitation and palliative care, among other actions from the doctor's office and the polyclinic, have a preponderant place.
To materialize this effort in the province of Holguín, 1,155 family doctor's offices are active, 1,140 of them in the community and 42 polyclinics, which cover the entire population, today with a life expectancy of 79.8 years in both sexes; although in women it is higher, with 81.8 and in men 77.9.
The community projection of this network includes actions carried out in the health areas, such as the one aimed at the prevention and control of non-communicable diseases (NCDs), which is today the main cause of morbidity, mortality and disability.
For example, in the "Alcides Pino" health area, one of the largest in the province, a project is underway aimed at the comprehensive management of NCDs, based on following the protocol drawn up by MINSAP specialists to control these conditions from educational actions, among them diabetes mellitus, Arterial Hypertension, asthma and cardiovascular diseases.
In the same way, the Heart Project, an initiative of the World League of Arterial Hypertension, whose objectives are put into practice in the Pedro Díaz Coello health area, where from the training of health professionals, conditions are improved to carry out research and adequate management in its population of hypertension, as a disease and the main risk factor that triggers other pathologies.
These and other experiences in development in Holguín communities are aimed at reducing the incidence of NCDs, which will result in promoting more health and a better quality of life.
