Towards process-oriented care delivery in hospitals

Working in a patient-friendly manner, good quality and affordable care, can be realised if hospitals make the transition from the traditional organisation in specialised departments to a process-oriented organisation. This was shown in a NIVEL study on which Leti Vos took her doctor’s degree on 7 October at Maastricht University Medical Center in the Netherlands.
 

For years already, long waiting lists for hospital appointments and defective matching between health care providers have been important points for improvement in order to make hospital care more patient-friendly. Leti Vos states that working in a patient-friendly manner and offering good quality and affordable care can be realised if hospitals make the transition from the traditional organisation in specialised departments to a process-oriented organisation. This requires specialisation in a limited number of disorders, which is still an issue in the rules and legislation of health care. The current DTC structure, in which financing is process-oriented, probably does stimulate the cooperation between various specialisations.