Optimizing healthcare for patients around the world

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Connecting those who care

In a world where individuals are increasingly taking control of their lives, it is only natural for healthcare providers to redesign their services to meet the various and changing needs of patients. Concurrently, the concept of focussing on the individual and his or her needs can be a challenging prospect for the healthcare sector. Healthcare organizations and healthcare providers are faced with diminishing resources and increasing workloads. In order to provide high-quality care on a continual basis, it is vital that they adopt a more flexible and proactive attitude, and evaluate the healthcare they provide.

Such change can only be brought about through cooperation. Healthcare providers will need to take on a more holistic approach. Getting to know the individual who is at risk of suffering or is already suffering from one or multiple chronic diseases, will broaden their view and will provide the insights needed to establish an effective course of action. To effectuate a comprehensive plan of treatment, social and healthcare providers and their services will need to coordinate their activities.

As we speak, more and more providers in countries around the globe are taking the first step towards integration, and yet, this first step may just as well be a giant leap into the unknown. Healthcare integration can be compared to a black box that may well or may not provide the ‘outside of the box’ solutions needed to help improve patients’ care experiences, health (outcomes), and to minimize costs. Fortunately, there is a lot to be learned from experience, and it is from our experience in the field of academic research that we have developed a tool for the evaluation of integrated care, called the Rainbow Model of Integrated Care RMIC.

With this tool, healthcare professionals, healthcare organizations, policymakers, researchers and government agencies will get to know the facts about this new form of social innovation. Healthcare systems will become transparent, thus enabling the healthcare society to drive quality improvement efforts on a continual basis. Our integrated care evaluation tool and this website can be regarded as an international evidence-based platform, on which all those involved in integrated care initiatives across the globe can make fact-based decisions by use of academic research and evaluation. Such evidence-based decision-making is needed to systematically integrate healthcare services and therefore improve the sustainability of our healthcare systems. No longer will integrated care be an enigma, but an evidence-based means of continual care optimization instead, beneficial to the individual and to society as a whole.

Integrated Care Evaluation
Connecting those who care