Strengthening Coordination Between Public Health and Healthcare-Module 4: Key Public Health Concepts

Pdf Summary

This document is a plain-language reference from the CMSS Public Health Education Toolkit that explains key public health terms for society staff, educators, and content developers. Its goal is to reduce jargon barriers and help clinicians understand how public health connects to clinical practice.<br /><br />It defines foundational concepts such as public health, population health, health-related social needs, social determinants of health, and the three levels of prevention: primary, secondary, and tertiary. It also describes major public health system concepts, including the 10 Essential Public Health Services, disease surveillance, notifiable diseases, and Healthy People 2030.<br /><br />The guide emphasizes how these pieces fit together: clinicians report notifiable conditions, reports feed surveillance systems, public health agencies investigate patterns and outbreaks, and early response reduces disease burden in clinical settings. It also explains basic epidemiology terms such as prevalence, incidence, morbidity, mortality, endemic, epidemic, pandemic, risk factors, rate versus count, age-adjusted rates, and community immunity.<br /><br />Additional sections define terms used in care coordination and referral, including community health workers, patient navigation, and closed-loop referral. It also covers data and quality terms like clinical data registries and quality improvement, showing how clinical data and QI work overlap with population health.<br /><br />The document notes that terminology can vary across organizations, and that “public health” is used broadly to include population health. Overall, it serves as a practical reference for creating educational materials, orienting authors, and helping members understand their role in the broader public health system.

Asset Subtitle

A Plain-Language Reference for Society Staff

Asset Caption

Module 4 of CMSS's Strengthening Coordination Between Public Health and Healthcare Toolkit. This module teaches and offers a refresher on the most common vocabulary and terms within the Public Health sphere.

Keywords

public health

population health

social determinants of health

prevention levels

disease surveillance

notifiable diseases

epidemiology

community health workers

quality improvement

health education toolkit