Integrated care: learning between high-income, and low- and middle-income country health systems

Integration is a challenging concept to define, in part because of its multiple dimensions and varied scope: from integrated clinical care for individual patients to broader systems integration- or linkage-involving wide range of interconnected services. This commentary compares integrated care in high-and lower- income countries. Although contexts may differ significantly between these settings, there are many common features of how integration has been understood and common challenges in its implementation

Integrated care: better and cheaper

Integrated care improves health, increases quality of care and lowers costs. These three goals, this Triple Aim in other words, are achieved in many examples from all over the world: from Alaska to New Zealand, from Western Europe to South Africa. However, disseminating all these good examples is easier said than done, as nationwide implementation means the simultaneous realisation of the following six components of integrated care:

1. Multidisciplinary care pathways and decision trees

2. Patient self-management and shared decision-making by patients and professionals

3. Guaranteeing professional and patient- perceived quality

4. Population-based funding and shared savings

5. An Electronic ...

Integrated care for older people: guidelines on community-level interventions to manage declines in intrinsic capacity

Guidelines on community-level interventions to manage declines in intrinsic capacity.

Revisiting Organisational Learning in Integrated Care

Progress in health care integration is largely linked to changes in processes and ways of doing. These changes have knowledge management and learning implications. For this reason, the use of the concept of organisational learning is explored in the field of integrated care. 

Centers of excellence in healthcare institutions: what they are and how to assemble them

Centers of excellence have the ability to dramatically enhance the depth and breadth of healthcare services available in communities. Given the numerous mutual benefits afforded by this delivery model, it is hoped that the light shed by this article will help healthcare providers better understand centers of excellence and be more capable and confident in associated development initiatives, affording greater opportunities for themselves and their patient populations. 

Supporting nurse practitioners’ practice in primary healthcare settings: a three-level qualitative model

While greater reliance on nurse practitioners in primary healthcare settings can improve service efficiency and accessibility, their integration is not straihtfoward, challenging existing role definitions of both registered nurses and physicians. This study´s main objetive is to examine different structures and mechanims put in place to support the development of primary healthcare nurse practitiones´s practice in different healthcare settings, and develop a practical model for identifying and planning adequate support practices. 

A new paradigm on health care accountability to improve the quality of the system: four parameters to achieve individual and collective accountability

Healthcare systems the world over are facing significant financial pressures and growing demands for services. Many nations have therefore set common goal of improving the population´s health, the quality of the outcomes, and the containment of costs. So, these changes in the health care systems´priorities have set the ground for an interdisciplinary approach necessary to assess the activities of health care professionals and, in general, of health care systems. 

Centers of excellence in healthcare institutions: what they are and how to assemble them

Centers of excellence-specialized programs within healthcare institutions which supply exceptionally high concentrations of expertise and related resources centered on particular medical areas and delivered in a comprehensive, interdisciplinary fashion-afford many advantages for healthcare providers and the populations they serve. To achieve full value from centers of excellence, proper assembly is an absolute necessity, but guidance is somewhat limited. This effectively forces healthcare providers to pursue establishment largely via trial-and-error, diminishing opportunities for success. 

Health assessments for health governance—concepts and methodologies

For better supporting science-governance interface, the potential of health assessments appear underrated. The aims of this article is to identify what various types of health assessment have in common; how they differ, which assessments to apply for which purpose; and what needs and options there are for future joint development. 

Interventions and approaches to integrating HIV and mental health services: a systematic review

• Available literature on interventions integrating HIV and mental health services reveal that there is much diversity in the approaches adopted in combining treatment modalities; ranging from integration within a single facility, to multi-facility integration, and integrated care coordinated by non-physician case managers.

• Existing evidence, although limited, suggest that integrating HIV and mental health services may be linked to improved patient and service delivery outcomes in diverse settings.

• There is a need for higher quality and robustly designed studies to evaluate and compare integration models at different levels of service delivery in terms ...