TOOLS FOR SOCIAL WELFARE AND HEALTHCARE SERVICES

Social welfare and healthcare services in the future will be provided through even closer co-operation between the public, private and third sectors in Finland. The project will develop tools for the management of the service network, consisting of several actors working across different sectors.

WHAT IS IT ABOUT?

The health, social services and regional government reform in Finland is aimed at modernising services and improving the sustainability of the public economy. The reform highlights the need to develop network co-operation, which can be used to organise the services as customer-oriented treatment chains. Co-operation between the public, private and third sectors requires new management tools.

Sitra’s aim is to gain experiences and information on the effects of the new operating models and tools. The experiences will be evaluated and effective models will be disseminated for others to use too.

What do we do?

The project Tools for social welfare and healthcare services is aimed at building concrete tools and operating models for the management of the social welfare and healthcare services network.

The project will model the network activities and the agreement practices for hybrid organisations consisting of a public operator, companies and third sector. Procurement expertise will be strengthened at the same time. The project will be implemented as part of the work on the Pirkanmaa 2019 health and social services reform and with the help of two examples: a responsible treatment and care organisation and the Tesoma well-being alliance. The first facilitates the treatment path for those suffering from heart failure and the second builds a well-being centre through network co-operation.

Alongside the projects in Pirkanmaa, a peer assessment of the best international network models for integrated treatment will be provided.

In addition, a legal analysis will be carried out to determine the possibility of the region, as the organiser of welfare and healthcare services, to act as a partner in the alliance.

The plan is to implement the tools and operating models in the organisations participating in the Pirkanmaa 2019 project. The experiences will be compiled into a management handbook that will be published in autumn 2018.

Who is participating?

The project participants are the Council of Tampere Region, City of Tampere, TAYS Heart Hospital, the Joint Municipal Authority of the Pirkanmaa Hospital District and the heart associations Hämeenmaan Sydänpiiri ry and Suomen Sydänliitto ry.

Where are we now?

The project was launched in spring 2017 and will end towards the end of 2018.

What have we achieved?

In addition to these projects, the Ministry of Social Affairs and Health and the Council of Tampere Region have drawn up a handbook for organising the health, social services and regional government reform. It is the first concrete tool for the region’s organisational duties and administration. The development of the handbook is continuing and comments on it can be submitted on the website (in Finnish or Swedish) of the health, social services and regional government reform. Basic information on the reform is available in English.