Obama - take a look at the Netherlands if you want to reform the US healthcare system in a good way!
The Netherlands are the overall winner in the Euro Health Consumer Index 2008, launched today in Brussels at a press conference hosted by the Health Consumer Powerhouse. The winner in 2005 regains its position after being the runner-up in 2006 and 2007. Constantly placed in the top of the HCP rankings ever since we started measuring healthcare in Europe, the Netherlands win this year with the biggest recorded margin to the runner-up so far. Dutch healthcare is also the sub-discipline winner on Range and Reach of Services Provided.
The Danish, Hungarian, Luxembourgish, Cypriot, French and Portuguese performances contrast sharply with the 2007 EHCI, the first three scoring remarkably better and the last three notably worse.
We see a downward trend for countries like Belgium, France and Sweden. These health systems do not keep up with the improvement rate found in countries like Denmark, Ireland, Czech Republic and Hungary. The Netherlands is the really stable top performer in all our indexes and we find that its healthcare system truly is Europe's best! The Netherlands have worked long on patient empowerment which now clearly pays off in many areas.
The conclusion is that to improve healthcare, it is important to recognize the link between medical outcomes and the easiness of access to services and quality information for patients. Good healthcare management and reform is not only a matter of money.
Even though countries from Central and Eastern Europe tend to concentrate in the lower part of the ranking, one Western country shares with them the bottom of the league: Portugal. Estonia is the winner of the "Bang-for-the-Buck", a value for money-adjusted score. It is obvious that the Index tries to compare states with very different financial resources. The annual healthcare spending, in PPP-adjusted (Purchasing Power Parity) US dollars, varies from around $600 in Bulgaria and Romania to $4000 - 5000 in Norway, Switzerland, and Luxembourg. The BFB result is an exercise that adjusts these expenditure differences. Here we also see that a lot of top runners also do well in the BFB exercise. Again, it is not all about money.
The Euro Health Consumer Index is the annual ranking of national European healthcare systems across six key areas: Patient rights and information, e-Health, Waiting time for treatment, Outcomes, Range and reach of services provided and Pharmaceuticals. 31 countries are covered. First published in 2005, the EHCI is sourced from public statistics and independent research. The producer is the analysis and information organisation Health Consumer Powerhouse. As with all other HCP Indexes, the organisation takes a consumer-centred position.
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