Sixth Salzburg Global session on Innovations in Health and Health Care opens
“You’re going to have to take risks if you want to build something new that lasts,” said Dr Albert Mulley, director at The Dartmouth Center for Health Care Delivery Science.
Dr Mulley was speaking to an audience invited to Salzburg Global on Sunday to participate in the session, ‘The Drive for Universal Health Coverage: Health Care Delivery Science and the Right to High-Value Health Care’.
The five-day session has been jointly organized by Salzburg Global, The Dartmouth Center and the World Bank Institute.
Participants will look at how we define and measure value in health care, how rights based approaches may work in differing income settings, and what we can learn from methods used in resource-constrained settings.
Dr Mulley was joined on the platform in Parker Hall by Dr Leonardo Cubillos, senior health specialist at the World Bank, and John Lotherington, program director at Salzburg Global.
Dr Cubillos said that he believed in the “transformative power of knowledge” and that health care should be based on AAAQ. AAAQ is acceptable, accessible and affordable, available and appropriate, and good quality.
This would be supported by participation, accountability, non discrimination, transparency, human dignity, empowerment, and the rule of law.
This is otherwise known as PANTHER, a practical framework for a rights-based approach to health systems, adapted by the World Bank Institute.
Lotherington said that the challenges facing health care were major, but the Seminar was a “unique space to come and think” of new ideas.He explained the fiscal pressures, and the epidemiological and demographic changes demanded a discussion on high-value health care.
Prior to this, the session had started with a warm welcome from Clare Shine, Vice-President and Chief Program Officer at Salzburg Global.Shine revealed health was at the cornerstone of Salzburg Global’s sustainability cluster. She added that participants could expect “hard, tough, engaging, interactive working sessions” that have the potential to shape the future agenda.
Participants heard a number of arguments from speakers, including the notion that in most developing countries, one of the biggest sources of waste is supply-sensitive care.It was soon after this that participants then discussed within smaller groups the issues they wished to see covered in the week ahead.
Whilst some participants asked how we could facilitate the change from low-value care to high-value care, others wished to know how citizens could be empowered to participate in the debate.
In order for citizens to feel empowered, it was argued that they would need to be “health literate” to begin with.Sessions that take place over the next couple of days will set the agenda for the rest of the week.
Lotherington revealed that he hoped this week’s discussions would lead to the formulation of a Salzburg Statement.
The first country/regional team meetings will take place later today to define the key questions that need to be answered in order for us to move forward and will inspire new change strategies and action plans.
