Can Integrated Care Help in Meeting the Challenges Posed on Our Health Care Systems by COVID-19? Some Preliminary Lessons Learned from the European VIGOUR Project

The COVID-19 pandemic puts health and care systems under pressure globally. This current paper highlights challenges arising in the care for older and vulnerable populations in this context and reflects upon possible perspectives for different systems making use of nested integrated care approaches adapted during the work of the EU-funded project VIGOUR (“Evidence based Guidance to Scale-up Integrated Care in Europe”).

Integrated and patient-centred management of Parkinson’s disease: a network model for reshaping chronic neurological care

Chronic neurological diseases are the leading cause of disability globally. Yet, our health-care systems are not designed to meet the needs of many patients with chronic neurological conditions. Care is fragmented with poor interdisciplinary collaboration and lack of timely access to services and therapies. Furthermore, care is typically reactive, and complex problems are managed inadequately because of a scarcity of disease-specific expertise and insufficient use of nonpharmacological interventions. Treatment plans tend to focus on the disease rather than the individual living with it, and patients are often not involved in clinical decision making. By use of Parkinson’s disease as ...

Evaluating Large-Scale Integrated Care Projects: The Development of a Protocol for a Mixed Methods Realist Evaluation Study in Belgium

The twelve Integrated Care Program pilot projects (ICPs) created by the government plan ‘Integrated Care for Better Health’ aim to achieve four outcome types (the Quadruple Aim) for people with chronic diseases in Belgium: improved population health, improved patient and provider experiences and improved cost efficiency. The Belgian plan is based on the model of integrated care by the World Health Organization. The objective of this study is to deliver policy recommendations on strategies and best practices to improve care integration in Belgium and to implement a sustainable monitoring system that serves both policy makers and the stakeholders within the ...

What Do Parents Expect in the 21st Century? A Qualitative Analysis of Integrated Youth Care

To provide integrated Youth Care responsive to the needs of families with multiple problems across life domains, it is essential to incorporate parental perspectives into clinical practice. The parental perspectives on integrated Youth Care in this study emphasize that parents have a strong desire for a family-centred approach and active participation in decision making over their own care process. However, since parental expectations regarding these key components of integrated Youth Care are somewhat opposing, professionals should be aware of potential confusion and explicitly discuss mutual expectations during a care process. 

Learning from Gothenburg model of person centred healthcare

Providing person centred care is a growing imperative across healthcare. The core component of person centred care is the co-creation of care through partnership between patients, their families and carers, and health professionals. While much of the recent literature has focused on why we need to change to a more person centred approach with greater involvement of patients and the public in health and healthcare, little information is available on how to do it and whether it makes any difference. Over the past 10 years a model of person centred care has been studied and implemented in Sweden and has ...

Integrated Care for Older People and the Implementation in the INSPIRE Care Cohort

Proposal based on the Integrated Care Manual for the Elderly (ICOPE),  has been developed by the World Health Organization (WHO) to meet the health needs and demands of rapidly aging populations around the world. The Manual helps to set person-centered goals and integrate approaches at the system, service, and clinical levels. The care plan can include multiple interventions to manage declining capacity, provide social and support, develop self-management skills, and support caregivers.

The main objective of the INSPIRE study is to build a Bio-resource Research Platform for Healthy Ageing gathering biological, clinical and digital resources in order to identify markers ...

Understanding integrated care at the frontline using organisational learning theory: A participatory evaluation of multi-professional teams in East London

Integrated care has been proposed as an organising principle to address the challenges of the rising demand for care services and limited resources. There is limited understanding of the role of learning in integrated care systems. Organisational Learning (OL) theory in the guise of ‘Learning Practice’ can offer a lens to study service integration and reflect on some of the challenges faced by multi-professional teams in developing a learning culture.

The study presents findings from two qualitative evaluations of integrated care initiatives in three East London boroughs, England, undertaken between 2017 and 2018.

Different Contexts, Similar Challenges. SUSTAIN’s Experiences with Improving Integrated Care in Europe

SUSTAIN stands for ‘Sustainable Tailored Integrated Care for Older People in Europe’ (www.sustain-eu.org). The SUSTAIN-project was carried out between 2015 and 2019 by thirteen partners from eight European countries: Austria, Belgium, Estonia, Germany, Norway, Spain, the Netherlands, and the United Kingdom.

The SUSTAIN project was designed to support the development of integrated care for older people living at home with health and social care needs. Its objectives were twofold: 1. To support and monitor improvements to established integrated care initiatives and 2. To contribute to the adoption and application of such improvements to other health ...

Impact of the CareWell integrated care model for older patients with multimorbidity: a quasi-experimental controlled study in the Basque Country

Older patients with multimorbidity have complex health and social care needs, associated with elevated use of health care resources. The CareWell program for older patients with multimorbidity, is based on the coordination between health providers, home-based care and patient empowerment, supported by information and communication technology tools. The implementation of CareWell integrated care model changed the profile of health resource utilization, strengthening the key role of primary care and reducing the number of emergency visits and hospitalizations

Collaboration for Impact: Co-creating a Workforce Development Toolkit Using an Arts-based Approach

The identification, communication and management of health risk is a core task of Community Health Workers who operate at the boundaries of community and primary care, often through not-for-profit community interest companies. However, there are few opportunities or resources for workforce development. Publicly funded researchers have an obligation to be useful to the public and furthermore, university funding is increasingly contingent on demonstrating the social impact of academic research. Collaborative work with participants and other stakeholders can have reciprocal benefits to all but may be daunting to some researchers, unused to such approaches.