Comparison Of Primary Health Care In New Zealand And UK In An Essay.

Apply your growing knowledge of systems thinking to a critical comparison of the health systems in different countries.
Task:
Use the WHO Building Blocks for a health system to compare and contrast the approaches to public health in two different nations.
Instructions:
1. Select a country to compare with New Zealand.
2. Refer to the WHO Building Blocks for a health system: structure your essay around these building blocks.
3. Outline the main features of each country’s health system using these building blocks.
4. Discuss the comparison between the two countries, including any relevant social, cultural, political or economic factors.

The WHO Health Systems Framework

Health setting consists of institutions, organizations, resources, health care professionals and the care givers whose primary concern is to provide health benefits to the public. A health system should be able to deliver promotive, preventive, rehabilitative and curative interventions by a combination of a health care pyramid and actions of the public health, that deliver individual healthcare (Frieden, 2010). A health system should be financially fair and also should be responsive while providing treatment to the patient (Mozzialos et al., 2015). A health system requires the fund supplies, efficient staffs, communication and transport to provide an overall guidance to provide a proper health care to the clients.

This essay compares the primary healthcare setting between the New Zealand and UK. In order to compare this, the building blocks set up by the WHO have been taken into consideration (Mozzialos et al., 2015). The essay critically analyses the differences in terms of the social, cultural and political or economic differences of the two nations.  

There are different frame works set by WHO to measure the health system capacity like the inputs and the outputs and helps to relate the frameworks to the outcomes ("The WHO Health Systems Framework", 2017).

The strategic framework for the health system is required in order to bring out better outcomes from the health care settings. The health system framework includes the following- 1. The World Bank knobs framework 2. The WHO building blocks frame work 3. The WHO frame work for the assessment of the health system. Such frame works are required to strengthen the health system.

The WHO frame work describes the health system in terms of 6 core components which are also termed as the ‘building blocks’. They are- 1. The service delivery  2. The health information systems,  3. The health work force  4. Financing 5. Access to the essential life saving medicines 6. Governance or leadership. The main aim of this building block is to provide an improved health, responsiveness, social and financial protection from the risks involved in health care ("The WHO Health Systems Framework", 2017).

These six building blocks can strengthen the health care setting in many ways. Some components like the governance leadership and the health information systems acts as the base of the regulation and the policy of the other building blocks. The crucial components of the building blocks are the health work force and the financing (Swayne et al., 2012). The technologies and the medical products and the service delivery show the immediate productivity of the health system. WHO’s original objective for the building blocks is to promote understanding of the health care setting, addressing new challenges related to the healthcare. It strengthens WHO’s role in the health care system in a world that is continuously changing (Fidler & Gostin, 2011).

Service Delivery

The service delivery component of the WHO health care settings set up standards for the essential service packages. It promotes the use and the access of services, provision of the prevention and the provision services locally. Human resources include the identification of the support to the community workers, partnership with the facility based workers for giving efficient services. It is to provide feedback regarding the performance of the health workers ("The WHO Health Systems Framework", 2017). The information component demand and use the information oversight. The financing component drives the resources allocation through the voting, taxes and purchasing decisions. The leader ship component designs the regulations and the policies, implement transparency and accountability ("The WHO Health Systems Framework", 2017).

The following essay aims to compare and contrast between the heath care system of New Zealand and the United Kingdom. The comparison has been done on the basis of the building block components set by WHO.

The health care system of New Zealand has undergone several changes over the past few years. In the 20^th century it was a public system, but in the last there decades many reforms have been introduced regarding insurances creating a public and private mixed system (Timmins & Ham, 2013).

The accident corporation covers the accident cases including the medical misadventure. There are relatively high care hospitals for the residents, that cost them free of charge treatment which is managed by the state boards. The difficult operations often take prolonged time unless it’s an emergency. For this reason, health insurance schemes have been introduced to accelerate the process ("New Zealand health system", 2017). These insurances fund the operations of their clients as per the different schemes. Emergency services are provided by the St. John New Zealand charity and the Wellington free ambulance. These are supported by a National both private and public funds. On the other hand the health care system in UK is provided by the National Health Service, which is England’s health care system that is publicly funded. It accounts for about most of the budget of the department of health (Steele & Cylus, 2012). The health care system in UK provides free ambulatory services in case of the emergencies. These services are generally supplemented by British Red cross and St Andrews ambulance association. Other than this air provides transportation system by the Scottish ambulance service in Scotland (Steele & Cylus, 2012). It has been reported that about 18% of the income tax of the citizens go towards the healthcare. About 4.5 % of the gross domestic product goes towards the health care, which is about 0.18984 trillion GDP. The growing private healthcare system of UK is smaller than the public sector. It has been found that the New Zealand spent almost 8.7% of the total GDP in healthcare (Winnard et al., 2012). Studies have shown that New Zealand spends the lowest level of medications use, and spends very low on the healthcare.  

Human Resources

The health information system of the UK consists of the commissioner, that is the primary care trusts, the providers such as the GPs and the hospitals (Burwell, 2015). Population information is provided by the office of National Statistics (England and Wales). The health and the social care information are provided by the NHS information center, PHOs, primary care and the hospital trusts (Gott et al., 2012). There are public health observatories that combine the qualities of the academic departments and the health departments to improve the health care. The health information strategy of New Zealand tries its best to meet the requirements of the national health information. Te department is involved in the funding and the regulation of the policies of the healthcare system. The information should be user friendly; they are able to provide the data from both manual and electronic based system (Winnard et al., 2012).

It has been reported that a growing and an ageing population has created challenges for the health care system of the New Zealand. Initiative has been taken to develop a dynamic and a sophisticated work force that covers demographies of the specialty specific workforce. The healthy work force New Zealand provides guidelines to the ministry of health and the director general of health to help the offices to rationalize with the work force planning. The health work force   facilitates to work with the stake holders in order to prepare a sustainable work force.

The workforce in the health care system of refers to those that are directly employed by the NHS in the hospital and the community health service, the GPs and the community health services. It has been reported that there were about 1,070,262 FTE staffs being appointed under the NHS.

Inequalities in access to essential medications indicate failures in the healthcare system. Although the health care system of the Zew Zealand has made considerable changes for the past few decades. Loops and gaps are still present when it come so that accessibility of the life giving medicines, and public always do not get access to the appropriate health care, specially who doesn’t come under the insurance coverages.

The UK health care system is mainly funded by the public. There are a number of regulatory bodies that monitor the type of care provided by the public and the private sectors.  There are 3 bodies that are responsible for the regulation of the health insurance in UK. The type of care provided is monitored by the department of health or the regional organizations.

Healthcare Information Systems

The normal expenditure on the health care system in UK is increasing gradually. This year it has been reported to be an extra $879 million ("New Zealand health system", 2017).  The political, social and the cultural differences between the two nations also cater to the differences in the health care system. It has been reported that the New Zealanders enjoy a high health status as compared to the international standards. It has been reported that the current life expectancy rate is about 82 years for woman and 78 years for the men. In comparison to this the life expectancy rate of UK is much lower.

The essay provides us with an idea about the different building blocks of the health care setting. These building blocks have been set up by WHO, in order to provide a proper health care to the public. The whole essay provides with a vivid description regarding the health care settings in New Zealand and UK. A comparison had been brought regarding the health care strategies of these two nations structuring and following the WHO framework. The framework had been able to bring out the different aspects and the components of the health system that an organization should follow. It critically analyses the differences in the health care techniques regarding the health care policies, funding system. It also compares about the different life expectancy rates. Finally it can be concluded that a lot more researches are still required to cover the loops and the holes of the health care system of both the countries.

References:

Burwell, S. M. (2015). Setting value-based payment goals—HHS efforts to improve US health care. N Engl J Med, 372(10), 897-899.

Fidler, D. P., & Gostin, L. O. (2011). The WHO pandemic influenza preparedness framework: a milestone in global governance for health. Jama, 306(2), 200-201.

Frieden, T. R. (2010). A framework for public health action: the health impact pyramid. American journal of public health, 100(4), 590-595.

Gott, M., Seymour, J., Ingleton, C., Gardiner, C., & Bellamy, G. (2012). ‘That’s part of everybody’s job’: the perspectives of health care staff in England and New Zealand on the meaning and remit of palliative care. Palliative Medicine, 26(3), 232-241.

Mossialos, E., Wenzl, M., Osborn, R., & Anderson, C. (2015). International profiles of health care systems. The Commonwealth Fund, 2016.

New Zealand health system. (2017). Ministry of Health NZ. Retrieved 9 September 2017, from https://www.health.govt.nz/new-zealand-health-system

Steele, D., & Cylus, J. (2012). United Kingdom (Scotland): health system review. Health systems in transition, 14(9), 1-150.

Swayne, L. E., Duncan, W. J., & Ginter, P. M. (2012). Strategic management of health care organizations. John Wiley & Sons.

The WHO Health Systems Framework. (2017). WHO Western Pacific Region. Retrieved 9 September 2017, from https://www.wpro.who.int/health_services/health_systems_framework/en/

Timmins, N., & Ham, C. (2013). The quest for integrated health and social care: a case study in Canterbury, New Zealand. Kings Fund.

Winnard, D., Wright, C., Taylor, W. J., Jackson, G., Te Karu, L., Gow, P. J., ... & Dalbeth, N. (2012). National prevalence of gout derived from administrative health data in Aotearoa New Zealand. Rheumatology, 51(5), 901-909.