{"id":31713,"date":"2014-06-04T16:41:34","date_gmt":"2014-06-04T15:41:34","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.bmj.com\/bmj\/?p=31713"},"modified":"2014-07-01T13:57:35","modified_gmt":"2014-07-01T12:57:35","slug":"muir-gray-population-health-whats-in-a-name","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.bmj.com\/bmj\/2014\/06\/04\/muir-gray-population-health-whats-in-a-name\/","title":{"rendered":"Muir Gray: Population health\u2014what\u2019s in a name"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"muir_gray\"<\/a>Suddenly the word population is everywhere. The Oxford University Department of Public Health is now the Department of Population Health Sciences, the Institute for Healthcare Improvement has added population health to form its triple aim<\/a>, the American Hospital Association talks about a second wave of hospitals with population health as their theme. Furthermore, Public Health England has launched Population Healthcare, which is defined below:<\/p>\n

“The aim of population healthcare is to maximise value and equity by focusing not on institutions, specialties, or technologies, but on populations defined by a common symptom, condition, or characteristic, such as breathlessness, arthritis, or multiple morbidity.”<\/p>\n

Population health is a broader concept than population healthcare. It is the health status of a population and is determined by many factors other than the healthcare that is focused on populations. Nevertheless, population healthcare offers us the opportunity to\u00a0increase the value of available resources in a way that will not be possible through a more intense focus on the bureaucracies that have served us well, but which are insufficient to meet the challenges of the 21st century. There are three types of bureaucracies:<\/p>\n