In measuring health care needs health care purchasers are charged with being responsive to the communitys interests and patients preferences yet peoples demands for health care are based on a desire to be healthy and not on the quite different ability to benefit from health care which characterises the definition of epidemiologically . Needs assessment from theory to practice andrew stevens the purpose of needs assessment in health care is to gather the information required to bring about change beneficial to the health of the population health care needs assessment the epidemiologically based needs assessment reviews vol 1 oxford radcliffe medical . This study overall considers questions such as the populations needs the services available or unavailable to them the effectiveness of these services and other perspectives in disease and service areas this is the second series of needs assessment reviews. This is the third book in a series of health care needs assessment reviews containing a series of reviews of 11 high cost high volume high morbidity and mortality conditions by 31 experts in the field. The assessment of individuals needs may form part of the assessment of a populations needs but it may be costly and it risks ignoring individuals with needs who do not present themselves for health care