Norway: Clinical priority guidelines and access to specialised
health care
Norway decided to update their system to set health care priorities. In 2013, the Patient Rights Act was amended to simplify the priority setting process for specialized elective health care and to improve access to care. And now, this is what they have:
Priority for treatment is now determined by only two criteria: 1) clinical effectiveness; and 2) cost-effectiveness of the intervention. There are 33 clinical priority setting guidelines organised by medical specialty, which help hospitals evaluate whether individual patients have a right to access care.Health policy must define priorities, it is not only a professional issue. Unfortunately by now, in our country are quite far from Norway, geographically and politically.
The revised guidelines define and score a total of 556 condition-intervention pairs, and will give all patients who are evaluated as having a need for specialist elective healthcare the right to access these services
People on the waiting list? In Catalonia there are 736.000 citizens (10% of population) waiting for an appointment, test or hospitalization. SOMEBODY SHOULD SOMETHING
Weegee by Weegee in Barcelona
