Investments in better ICT and diagnostic technologies that make highly personalised healthcare possible really do pay off. Not only do patients benefit, but there are economic gains too. Particularly for breast cancer and cardiovascular disease – two of the most common health conditions today – the long-term costs can be dramatically reduced by better screening of patients and easier access to treatment and medication. This opens the door for new and innovative initiatives from the business world. These are the findings of recent research by Professor Walter Van Dyck at Vlerick Leuven Gent Management School in conjunction with Science|Business.
Ageing populations are increasingly confronting the elderly care provision systems in Western countries with a number of challenges, including increasing and changing needs, personnel shortages and financial challenges. This calls for new policy strategies and rethought and restructured organisations and institutions.
A new study reveals that responsive, flexible hospital supply chains are commonplace rather than exceptional. That’s good news – but what challenges still remain? Vast, highly complex and in a state of perpetual change, the healthcare industry is both recipient and dispenser of significant financial sums. In Flanders, hospitals alone account for some 7bn euro of annual spend. And while clinical quality and patient safety have always been paramount, today, managers increasingly face challenges brought about by rising costs (such as staff and R&D) and falling public investment. A degree of consolidation may have helped, by way of pooled resources and systems – but for many hospitals, this barely scratches the surface.
In the summer of 2006, some conflicts arose between the emergency department (ED) and some of the internal nursing departments (INDs) of Ghent University Hospital. The ED staff did not understand why the CEO had communicated a message about the low occupancy rate of the beds in the hospital, because he had been confronted for some years with the phenomenon of access blocking in the ED. Furthermore, the ED staff had evidence of the fact that the access of patients from the ED to the INDs was being blocked even though there were free beds in these nursing departments. As a consequence, the ED regularly became overcrowded, which led to an unacceptable workload for the ED staff.