[Opinion] Healthcare not sickcare
Excellent post by Martin Carpenter on unwarranted variation in healthcare which asks the question: 'What would a blank-page NHS Target Operating Model' look like?
Whilst I would totally agree with the use of commodity components where needed and the questioning of unwarranted variation, from the mapping work done in 2023 (by nurses, doctors etc) examining topics such as clinical pathways and the healthcare value chain, which led to the attached table (focus of investment) then I would personally start with a target operating model based upon PROMs (patient reported outcome measures) with sharing of medical data.
What we currently have is a ClinROs (clinician reported outcomes) based sickcare system i.e. very good at treating symptoms and not necessarily making people healthy. Yes, you can make that more efficient and remove unwarranted variation but as the old joke goes 'Well, if I were you, I wouldn't start from here'.
If we were starting from scratch, I'd go for healthcare not sickcare.
Originally published on LinkedIn.