Health care reform and financial crisis in the Netherlands: consequences for the financial arena of health care organizations.

Over the past decade, many health care systems across the Global North have implemented elements of market mechanisms while also dealing with the consequences of the financial crisis. Although effects of these two developments have been researched separately, their combined impact on the governance of health care organizations has received less attention. The aim of this study is to understand how health care reforms and the financial crisis together shaped new roles and interactions within health care. The Netherlands - where dynamics between health care organizations and their financial stakeholders (i.e., banks and health insurers) were particularly impacted - provides an illustrative case. Through semi-structured interviews, additional document analysis and insights from institutional change theory, we show how banks intensified relationship management, increased demands on loan applications and shifted financial risks onto health care organizations, while health insurers tightened up their monitoring and accountability practices towards health care organizations. In return, health care organizations were urged to rearrange their operations and become more risk-minded. They became increasingly dependent on banks and health insurers for their existence. Moreover, with this study, we show how institutional arenas come about through both the long-term efforts of institutional agents and unpredictable implications of economic and societal crises.

Power, legitimacy and urgency: Unravelling the relationship between Dutch healthcare organisations and their financial stakeholders.

Healthcare organisations rely on their financial stakeholders for capital to invest in state-of-the-art buildings, equipment, innovation and the delivery of healthcare services. Nevertheless, relations between healthcare organisations and their financial stakeholders have not been well studied. Here, we studied the relations between Dutch healthcare organisations and two of their main financial stakeholders (banks and health insurers) against the backdrop of system reforms and the financial crisis. We conducted a survey of healthcare executives to evaluate their relations with banks and health insurers in terms of power, legitimacy and urgency. These three attributes are based on the salience model of Mitchel, Agle and Wood (1997). We further tested for differences in power, legitimacy and urgency across organisational sector and size. The results showed that healthcare organisations value banks as legitimate stakeholders with a well-demarcated influence and a clear-cut function. The relationship with health insurers is more complex. Healthcare organisations experience considerable influence from health insurers but question the legitimacy of their claims. Since health insurers play a crucial role in the Dutch healthcare system, these findings question the workability of the relationship between healthcare organisations and health insurers and the position of health insurers in the overall healthcare sector. Our results are relevant to countries with public-private health systems and contribute to the development of the salience model by showing the individual value of stakeholder attributes and the relevance of context.

[Regional healthcare labels: differences in care needs and psychosocial functioning]. / Regionale zorgvignetten: verschillen in zorgbehoeften en psychosociaal functioneren.

BACKGROUND: Severe mental illnesses (SMI) are associated with high mental healthcare and other healthcare costs. In 2012, mental healthcare labels were developed to create more transparency between insurance companies, municipalities, and mental healthcare. The labels are based on care intensity, and should provide a regional overview of the present groups of patients with SMI.
AIM: Explore the functionality and validity of the used labels in relation to needs for care and psychosocial functioning.
METHOD: The ROM data (needs for care, functioning) from 706 patients were tested per label by Chi-square tests and ANOVAs. For two high complex labels (alarming care avoiders and persons with safety risks), repeated measures ANOVAs and McNemar tests were used to analyse changes in functioning and needs over time.
RESULTS: To a limited extent, the labels were distinctive in care needs and functioning. The most restrictions in functioning and (unfulfilled) needs were present in the labels 'alarming care avoiders' and 'avoiding danger'. These findings were stable over time.
CONCLUSION: The labels are not sufficiently distinctive. To enhance regional care planning, it is desirable to combine existing information on healthcare labels with information on care needs and functioning. KEY WORDS functioning, mental healthcare labels, needs for care, routine outcome monitoring, severe mental illness.

[Towards a sustainable, cost-effective mental health care; a policy perspective]. / Op weg naar een duurzame ggz; een beleidsperspectief.

BACKGROUND: After a decade of robust growth in spending, Dutch mental healthcare is on a more stricter budgetary path since 2012. High prevalence of illness and limited spending, imply the need for efficient mental healthcare delivery.
AIM: To advise how mental health care can be managed more efficiently. There will also have to be more differentiation between mild and serious psychiatric illnesses.
METHOD: Review of academic articles and policy studies.
RESULTS: With regard to the treatment of fairly common disorders, more attention needs to be given to integrated basic care and e-health. Employers and stakeholders can perhaps play a role in financing some of these services. Severe mental disorders can be handled more often on an integrated ambulatory basis setting than only in a hospital setting, while scaling down inpatient capacity. These steps would represent a major transition and would require spending cuts and a change in the provider 'landscape'.
CONCLUSION: Sustainable mental healthcare is inseparably linked to an agenda that provides value for money and it implies a major transition. However, in principle, it should be possible to fit these changes into the current system of governance. More attention needs to be given to coordination between the various domains, and to a reduction in administrative costs. Reimbursement methods should align e-health, collaborative care, case-management and best-practice pathways.

Redesigning mental healthcare delivery: is there an effect on organizational climate?

OBJECTIVE: Many studies have investigated the effect of redesign on operational performance; fewer studies have evaluated the effects on employees' perceptions of their working environment (organizational climate). Some authors state that redesign will lead to poorer organizational climate, while others state the opposite. The goal of this study was to empirically investigate this relation. DESIGN: Organizational climate was measured in a field experiment, before and after a redesign intervention. At one of the sites, a redesign project was conducted. At the other site, no redesign efforts took place. SETTING: Two Dutch child- and adolescent-mental healthcare providers. PARTICIPANTS: Professionals that worked at one of the units at the start and/or the end of the intervention period. INTERVENTION: The main intervention was a redesign project aimed at improving timely delivery of services (modeled after the breakthrough series). MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES: Scores on the four models of the organizational climate measure, a validated questionnaire that measures organizational climate. RESULTS: Our analysis showed that climate at the intervention site changed on factors related to productivity and goal achievement (rational goal model). The intervention group scored worse than the comparison group on the part of the questionnaire that focuses on sociotechnical elements of organizational climate. However, observed differences were so small, that their practical relevance seems rather limited. CONCLUSIONS: Redesign efforts in healthcare, so it seems, do not influence organizational climate as much as expected.