Refocusing health care systems to address both individual care and population health

Population health depends on a qualitatively different set of investigative methods, decision-making procedures, and assignment of responsibility for action than those applied in the health care systems of Canada today. The focus shifts from a major preoccupation with acute and curative medicine to a greater concern with disease prevention and health promotion, from health outcomes as ends in themselves to quality of life concerns defined not just by the individual but also by the community. To achieve this refocusing, the health care system must decentralize the decision-making processes from provincial to regional and community levels, reorient the medical schools and hospitals from their increasingly global orientation to a greater role in the promotion of health in their own communities, and engage a broader range of disciplines and non-medical groups in partnerships and coalitions for health research and action.