Abstracts by keywords: Health Care Research
The German Medical Association defines health services research (1) as the scientific study of the provision of health-related products and services to individuals and the population (2) under everyday conditions. For this purpose, health services research examines how access to health and health care, how its quality and costs and ultimately how our health and well-being are influenced by the financing systems, by social and individual factors, by organizational structures and processes and by health technologies ( 3). The observation units include individuals, families, populations, organizations, institutions, municipalities, etc. In addition to this definition of content, the German Medical Association offers a methodological/functional definition of health services research, describes the general objective of health services research and names the systematics/components (input-throuput- Output-outcome) of health services research (1). In our article we would like to expand this characterization of health services research to include five further tasks: the distinction between care and research, the economic definition of over- and under-care, the description of the data and methods required for health services research, and the distinction between economically complete and incomplete health care analyses and ultimately the formal medical (in addition to the commercial) assessment of effort and return, including a method for identifying patient-relevant endpoints.
24.01.2013
The disease management programs (DMP) aim to improve medical care for chronically ill patients across the board. The goal of the treatment program is to coordinate patient treatment throughout the entire course of a chronic illness and across the boundaries of individual service providers and to optimize the patient's health based on medical evidence. On the one hand, it is about minimizing the “variance” of treatment by the practitioner (Glaeske 2011) and enabling treatment principles for treatment by the medical profession based on medical evidence. On the other hand, the patient should also be actively involved in the treatment process. In the doctor-patient interaction, treatment goals should be set in terms of lifestyle changes or the achievement of medical values. The treatment steps and the health condition are recorded in a documentation form by the treating doctor. As part of the legal evaluation of the DMP, service expenditure and survey data on health-related quality of life are also collected for a sample of patients. This data is linked and evaluated – in a pseudonymized form – at the individual level.
24.02.2012
In the course of the Europeanization of the healthcare system, interest in healthcare system comparisons has also increased noticeably. Looking beyond one's own health policy inevitably enables the strategic further development of best-practice approaches in the health sector. The instruments of the open method of coordination (OMK) adopted by the EU are proving to be a creative driving force in the development of a Europe-wide comparison of health systems. Health policy reform processes triggered by this should also undergo a regular controlling process at the health care level, which requires the targeted methodical use of health care research. As a result, a European model of health services research could be on the health policy agenda in the foreseeable future.