ABSTRACT
Health care is produced by system inputs that interact with the population through various processes and result in health outcomes. PHC is unique because it tends to be a patient's point of entry into health care systems, and such care is at the centre of a network of providers working within and across primary, secondary, tertiary acute and social care boundaries. Masuda and Crooks argue for an experiential approach' which privileges the role of human agency in supra-local encounters. Safran et al'.s seven defining characteristics of PHC include access, continuity, integration, comprehensiveness, whole-person orientation, clinical interaction, and sustained clinician-patient relationship. These appear to match a larger scale, group orientation to PHC practice. Safran et al seven defining characteristics of PHC, include access, continuity, integration, comprehensiveness, whole-person' orientation, clinical interaction, and sustained clinician-patient relationship. In Canada, health care in general and PHC in particular is the constitutional responsibility of the provincial governments.
