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Individual Health Care: A health manpower report prepared by the National Commission of Community Health Services showed that the U.S. hospitals and health organizations were maintaining the ratio of 150 doctors per 100,000 population only by filling out one-fifth of their needs with physicians from other countries. The demand for health care had also created serious shortages of nurses and other paramedical personnel. Among the solutions being suggested were new methods of health care organization and government support for new or expanded education programs in the health sciences.
The major types of supplementary care are day care and homemaka service. Day care is a method of supplementing parental functioning by providing care and training opportunities for children during some part of the 24-hour day. As with full-time foster care, a number of metiiods, kinds of settings, or types of program have been developed. One of the most widespread programs is family day care, individual health care care and "mothering" in the warmth and safety of a normal family home. In the United States family day care is viewed as most suitable for babies or very young children whose own mothers' must work and whose developmental needs require this kind of individual health care attention and continuity of relationship to one substitute mother person.
The nationwide study of health instruction, and the resultant kindergarten through grade 12 curriculum development project of the School Health Education Study, has been recognized as an outstanding curriculum project.
The United States has led the way in establishing health education as a profession in its own right. Other countries have tended to follow the traditional pattern, stressing physical fitness and personal hygiene rather than a broad approach to the health of the individual health care and the environment. Nevertheless, health education has made major contributions to public health—as in Canada, where most elementary and secondary schools include health as part of the curriculum. |
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