Functional Integration of Health Services

Abstract

An attainable vision or utopian dream? In posing the question, clarity must be given as to what is meant by the phrase. In this short article the brief and simple definition is: the combining of all activities of health service provision to clients and patients in a way that ensures the coordination and interrelationships of an individual's required services are inherently controlled rather than extrinsically managed by the client's own actions. A career of over 20 years of health service management experience at the senior level has provided me with the opportunity to experience the consequences of system failure. Appointments not being made, diagnostic results not being provided where and when required, discharge schedules not being communicated to carers and other service providers, care plans remaining at their origins and not intended destinations, incorrect administration of drugs and the list could go on. If it was not for the well educated, well-informed alert clients and patients in our care, the incidents of communication breakdown would be much greater. Chronic conditions and even acute conditions of our clients create huge challenges for those individuals and their families without imposing the additional burden of being responsible for linking every facet of the system together to ensure the projected health outcomes are achieved. The system itself should assume this responsibility, not the consumer of the service.