According to the OECD (Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development) the UK is lagging in efficiency compared to other similar healthcare systems around the world including Italy, Norway, Poland and Portugal. Whilst there is a chance that recent funding changes are still ‘working through the system’ it is likely that even when this is taken into account the NHS will continue to have a lower efficiency than comparable systems elsewhere.
Some of this is related to the way that our system is set up to encourage organisations not to work together effectively by focusing on the income of individual organisations and not focusing on ‘whole systems’ working and the efficiencies of whole pathways. Even more inefficiency is brought about by the inherentcultural inertia in the system brought about by low levels of trust between teams and between organisations and a desire for individual organisations to implement their own transformation plans in isolation of other organisations, even when most patient pathways span at least two and often more organisations.
Do these behaviours lead to optimum performance? Well, with examples cited by the OECD in the UK of high unneccessary admission rates for things such as COPD and Asthma and other evidence about the actual amount of time spent by clinicians working directly with patients would suggest that a fragmented approach to transformation would be sub-optimal.
To find out how we can help you create an integrated transformation plan contact us today on 0870-446-1002.
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