Purchasing of Healthcare
Purchasing of Healthcare is concerned with...
The financial sustainability of the healthcare system is a challenge many countries are facing across the globe. Healthcare spending in developed economies averages approximately 10% of GDP, with the USA topping the charts with over 15% of GDP spent on healthcare. The Netherlands also has a relatively high level of healthcare spend, amounting to 11% of GDP. With some variation based on definition and source, healthcare spend in The Netherlands totaled 70-90 billion Euro in 2013.
Many developed economies have established a healthcare system with a purchaser-provider split and have introduced regulated market competition with the aim to increase access to healthcare, to improve quality, and to manage costs. Providers focus on delivering the most cost-effective treatment, while purchasers represent the healthcare users as they determine healthcare needs, select and contract providers, pay for care provision, and manage provider contracts. Professional purchasing of healthcare, also called “healthcare commissioning” or “healthcare contracting”, is a key instrument to achieve the aims regarding healthcare quality, cost and accessibility.
Healthcare quality and cost are further impacted by the professional purchasing of goods and services used by healthcare providers. This purchasing for healthcare (also called “supply management” or “procurement”) entails all activities within and between organisations aimed at securing clinical and non-clinical goods and services from suppliers at the most favorable conditions. For healthcare providers in developed economies, purchasing spend represents 10-40% of their budget, while in developing economies it can represent more than 50 percent of a provider’s budget. Purchasing spend often grows at a higher rate than labor costs, the largest cost category for most healthcare providers.
The aim of this knowledge portal is to share academic knowledge and practical insights about both purchasing of care and purchasing for care, so as to help all stakeholders in healthcare to maximize health value for each monetary unit spent.