This report highlights and studies a major trend already underway in most health systems: the imperative to achieve better health outcomes and curb rising healthcare costs. Among G20+ nations, the significant challenges that confront health systems and which drive this shift include, among others, unsustainable cost increases, rising citizen demand for health services, poor uptake of innovations, widening disparities in access to individual and public health services, and worsening inequalities in health outcomes.
The overarching goal is to evolve their healthcare systems to provide ‘value for money and value for many’ by focusing on efficiency, effectiveness, equity, and responsiveness.
As part of the Hub Innovation Series, we talked to Professor Rifat Atun, Dr. Che Reddy, and Johnattan Garcia Ruiz from the Health Systems Innovation Lab at Harvard University.
In this episode, they present the findings from the collaborative study between Harvard and the Global Innovation Hub. The team discusses a new framework to examine G20+ countries’ progress in transitioning to a high-value health system model. They highlight essential components and supportive conditions for this transition, emphasizing the need for digital data systems, analytics, cost and outcome measurement, integrated care pathways, value-based payment models, integrated provider networks, strategic change, and innovation.
This study is underpinned by the Harvard High-Value Health Systems Model (HVHS)
The Harvard HVHS model consists of 10 interdependent and mutually reinforcing design components (Figure 1) that characterize the ongoing transition in health systems towards a ‘value’ predominant system orientation. The HVHS model is detailed in Building a High-Value Health System, Transition to Health Systems: A Primer and a position paper on Rethinking Health System Design: Towards a High-Value Health System Model
The conceptual model builds on and represents an evolution of several critical HSIL frameworks, notably the HSIL Health System Framework and HSIL Complex Healthcare Innovation Framework – both of which have been used to examine health system performance and analyze the adoption and diffusion of innovations in health systems and have been applied in more than 30 countries. This prior knowledge and empirical evidence have helped to understand better how health systems behave in different countries, the major forces that influence their performance, and the policies, programs, institutional arrangements, and interventions designed to enhance system performance and ultimately inform the Harvard HVHS model.
This report has been created in collaboration with the Health Systems Innovation Lab at the Harvard T. H. Chan School of Public Health