Project Reviews the Progress of its First Year

September 30th 2008 saw the third meeting of the Steering Committee of the European Union-funded Project “Support to the Secondary Healthcare Reform” held at the Ministry of Healthcare of Ukraine.

Deputy Minister of Healthcare Dr. V. V. Lazoryshynets officially opened the meeting and defined the following priorities of the Ministry of Healthcare in its collaboration with the Project: further development of the system of contracting between the purchasers and providers of medical services; new approaches to investment planning at the hospital level, and implementation of innovative models of hospital network planning. He stressed the fact that it is vital for the Ministry of Finance and the Ministry of Economics to actively cooperate with the Project in order to find solutions to a number of current specific financial/fiscal obstacles to the delivery of innovative healthcare services by health authorities. The Steering Committee was also informed of the prepared draft resolution of the Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine, “On Support to the Implementation of the European Union Project «Support to the Secondary Healthcare Reform in Ukraine»”', the signing of which allows a comprehensive multilevel approach to the implementation of Project initiatives in the pilot regions.

At the Steering Committee meeting, Project team leader Greta Ross and Project director Oxana Abovs'ka presented a summary of the Project’s progress over the past 6 months, and presented the Synthesis Report “Reforming Secondary Healthcare in Ukraine: Background and Options”, prepared by the Project team. The report consists of three parts, the first of which deals with the analysis of the main trends in healthcare provision in Europe and the key issues characterising secondary healthcare. The second part makes an overview of the provision of hospital-based care in Ukraine founded on Ukrainian statistics on healthcare services. The third part is concerned with a possible way forward with reforming secondary healthcare services, elaborated within the framework of the Project, including options for hospital restructuring and the reconfiguration of medical services.

Mr. Yuri Voronenko, Rector of NMAPE, then described the detailed work being carried out by the Project on the development of a one-year modular curriculum for health service management that would train hospital managers and build HR capacity in new approaches needed for managing future health system reforms in Ukraine .

Representatives from the pilot regions spoke on the results of their cooperation with the Project and on the major achievements in the past six months. Previous EU projects had prepared the base for current new recommendations for hospital reconfiguration and regional strategic planning. For example, Mr. V.P. Lysak, Head of the Healthcare Department of the Poltava Regional State Administration, , reminded the Committee of the successful split between primary and second healthcare services in the towns of Komsomolsk and Pyriatyn.

The Project aims to support healthcare departments in the pilot regions as they work to improve the quality of healthcare services; one approach to achieve this is through establishing inter-district ‘hospital corporations’ giving neighbouring ditricts the opportunity to redistribute certain services more effectively among hospitals and other health facilities. Mr. Y.М. Kondratiev, Deputy Head of the Healthcare Department of the Kharkiv Regional State Administration,, informed the meeting about the progress of establishing an inter-district hospital corporation in the Lozova and Blyzniuky districts of the Kharkiv region. Mr. O. K. Tolstanov, Head of the Healthcare Department of the Zhytomyr Regional State Administration, presented a map of the Zhytomyr region which showed feasible options for creating inter-district hospital corporations within Zhytomyr. Each of the pilot regions representatives agreed, however, that  resistance to change on behalf of some local administration and financial control authorities remains as one of the main obstacles to successful reforming in the regions.

NEWS FLASH: November 6th -7th 2008 are the approved dates of the project’s National mid-term conference to be held at the Bratislava Hotel in Kyiv. This conference will feature two international keynote speakers as well as presenters from the beneficiary and the project team, and will offer a review and interim results of the Project’s work at the mid-point of the Project’s life.