The Practical Playbook is a stepping stone in the next transformation of health, in which primary care and public health groups collaborate to achieve population health improvement and reduced health care costs. It supports increased collaborations between primary care and public health groups by guiding users through the stages of building partnerships. Throughout each stage, the Practical Playbook provides helpful resources such as success stories from across the country, lessons-learned from existing partnerships, and further guidance from industry experts.

We use the playbook metaphor because improving collaboration between public health and primary care takes a thoughtful game plan. Like a sports playbook, the Practical Playbook defines the role of each team member as well as actions for different situations. As a playbook, it’s neither a rulebook nor a set of peer-reviewed guidelines. It’s something more practical – because we need real-life, flexible guidance to help us apply the theoretical principles of integration to our work.