During the day the hills outside Stuttgart are a mosaic of green threes and red brick houses, at night the lights of white and blue from the thousand windows cuts through a pitch black darkness. Same hills but seemingly two different worlds.
A similar experience is found in the healthcare system in Baden-Württemberg, where the fifth Exchange of Experience and Peer Evaluation (EEPE5) took place.
Here, the focus of the hosts themselves and from the delegations was on how to bridge the gabs between the actors in a very complex and highly fragmented system with a strong tradition within the institutions.
Talking challenges
As we know Germans like to cut straight to the chase so from the very morning of the first day, the delegations was given a thorough explanation of all the challenges that the Province of Baden-Württemberg has. The day continued in the LebensPhasenHaus to presentation of projects which are trying to implement a bottom-up approach based on the citizens’ need, and later the delegation members got the oppotunity to have a coffee and a more in-depth talk with the project managers.
Second day started out a bit softer with a trip to the Mercedes-Benz exhibit in order for the delegation members to get inputs on innovative solutions. Later, they were transported to co-working space and event venue WizeMannSpace, which resides in an old factory building, which, like many others, have been converted into a creative hub, to learn how innovative solutions make it into the health system.
Here the feedback session also took place, with participation of the director of Ministry og Social Affairs and Integration, Christine Engelhardt.
Points from the feedback session
- Baden-Württemberg should continue being innovative at setting up strategies in a complex system where there is lack of communication between public and private health providers while the legislation block data sharing.
- There are good flow in the first part of the innovation cycle from “invention” to “co-creation” and “market testing” but there is a missing link from the first three phases to the “route to market” and “scaling up” phase, because there is no way the system/insurance companies’ uptake or guarantee to take in new products
- To remedy the lack of qualified health labour in the future and the public health administration of bringing in many specialist to analyze and bring forward a first strategy, Baden-Württemberg need to connect the many innovative players in this eco-system better.
- Baden-Württemberg needs to be more precise in looking into which kind of interventions have the biggest impact to overcome labour lack of nurses and general practitioners and how the eco-system could jointly work on creating a common strategy and actions.
- There is very much focus on involving citizens and community in solving problems but very little on nurses and general practitioners’ knowledge in this context, and there is a lack of information flow between health providers. This needs to be established in order for them to work better together.
In addition, there is no funding after innovative projects are done, therefore Baden-Württemberg needs to look into the possibility to create funding for scaling up of good solutions.
This article is based on excerpts and notes from the feedback session. The final report from the Baden-Württemberg EEPE is under preparation.
