Inhalt des Dokuments
Health Policy Developments Issue 3: Focus on Accountability, (De)Centralization, Information Technologiesogies
Autor | Busse R, Schlette S |
Verlag | Gütersloh: Bertelsmann Foundation Publishers |
Abstract
The third issue of “Health Policy Developments” pays special
attention to five concurrent health policy topics, all of them high
on health policy agendas in a variety of developed countries:
– Accountability and participation
– Coordination of care
– Public health and prevention
– Centralization versus decentralization
– Technical innovations and bioethics
Two of these topics, accountability and prevention, are of particular
interest to the Bertelsmann Stiftung.
Accountability and
participation
As an independent yet not neutral player in the German health
care system, the Foundation examines health care services and
health policy reform from the specific, usually underrepresented
viewpoint of the insured themselves. Much lip service has been
paid to the importance of the informed patient, the patient as the
focus of attention, and the patient’s responsibility to participate in
the maintenance of good health and in the treatment process. In
practice, however, little has changed. Many stakeholders—insurers,
physicians, politicians, and the health care industry—-
claim to know what is best for the patients or so-called health care
consumers.
Behind these claims often lurk profit interests, professional
self-esteem, or—a variation of profit interests—the politician’s
pursuit of re-election. While this is not the place to challenge the
legitimacy of business or power interests, recent experience has
indeed shown just how important patient views are to policymakers.
In fact, politicians are increasingly sensitive and attentive
to their voters’ concerns about health care.