[Perspectives in the development of health care in Czechoslovakia]

The finding that the health status of the population is shaped in particular by social and cultural conditions is accepted not only by health workers but also by political and executive authorities of the State. For the further development health care of the people is of revolutionary importance. If society will find adequate political will to take the appropriate measures, we may expect radical changes in all spheres of national economy, social life, science and culture. The basic demand is that health workers must acquire new sociomedical thinking which supplements and at the same time replaces the out-dated biomedical pattern. Structural changes will pertain in particular to mechanisms and organizational measures which will ensure the implementation of the health policy beyond the framework of the health services. In the system of health services we may anticipate that the centre of gravity in health care will shift from the traditional hospital to out-patient facilities with emphasis on the newly conceived function of primary health care. Training of health workers will have to be modified to the effect that graduates will be better prepared to meet actual needs of health care focused on prevention, economy, effectiveness and quality. It will be necessary to create favourable conditions for the development of socio-ecological, epidemiological and operational research. The democratization of health care will call for greater interest and initiative on the part of the public as regards collective and individual health. Our partial health projects should be re-arranged into a single comprehensive nation-wide programme which will include all spheres of health care in the sense of the WHO programme in its modification for Europe.