Venue of the workshop: Hotel Slon, Ljubljana, Slovenia Registration closing date: Monday, April 23, 2007 Course objectives: The World Bank, in collaboration with the WHO, the European Observatory and the CEF will organize a two-day workshop on competition in health financing and strategic purchasing. Countries in Central and Eastern Europe have embarked on extensive health financing reforms in recent years. Many new EU member states and accession countries are in the process of revisiting the strategic and operational functions of their Social Health Insurance Funds with the objective of improving the effectiveness of collection, pooling, purchasing and coverage. Several factors are behind the new wave of planned reforms: (i) revenues have failed expectations; (ii) the informal sector and unemployed go without coverage; (iii) efficiency gains have often not been realized; (iv) cost-containment strategies have not worked as expected; (v) improvements in quality are still needed. Some countries are looking to other health insurance options as a way to address these problems, such as introducing voluntary insurance and competing managed insurance, following the example of Slovakia and other countries in Europe like Switzerland and the Netherlands. Other countries are exploring further refinements to provider payment mechanisms to increase efficiency in spending, like introduction of DRGs for acute inpatient care and similar systems for rehabilitation and nursing home care. These issues will be addressed in the following workshop. This workshop will present practical and operational issues in health financing related to competition and strategic purchasing. Financing and Insurance experts from Europe will present different health insurance and payment schemes and discuss evidence and best practice related to organizational structure, collection, pooling, and purchasing. The focus will be on two components: competition and purchasing and their contribution to goals such as improved revenue collection, efficiency and quality of care. Experts will present their practical experience about the necessary conditions for competition among insurers; the role of information; things to consider when implementing prospective provider payment; and strategic purchasing using provider profiling. The key expected outcomes of the course include: (i) improved knowledge among participants about competition in health insurance market, provider payment, provider performance analysis, and necessary institutional and operational reforms; (ii) establishment of contacts between representatives of various countries engaged in health financing reforms. Presentations from: Topics covered: Overview on health financing functions What is competition supposed to achieve in health: Evidence from insurance markets in Switzerland, Netherlands and Slovakia Mechanisms that neutralize the effect of competition Institutional requirements to support the effect of competition Reallocation mechanisms, competition, and the impact on efficiency Adverse behaviour by insurers and how to correct for it Provider payment methods Strategic purchasing using provider profiling in a competitive market Evidence of strategic purchasing and competition and the impact on health expenditures
Contribution from participants: Who should attend: The workshop is open to interested participants working in Ministries, health insurers and hospitals, from the Europe and Central Asia Region and the Middle East and North Africa Region. PLEASE NOTE: The language of the course is ENGLISH. There is no fee for the workshop. Contact info Workshop coordinator: Helena Jagodic CENTER OF EXCELLENCE IN FINANCE Cankarjeva 18, 1000 Ljubljana, SLOVENIA Tel. +386 1 369 61 90, Fax. +386 1 369 62 44 E-mail: info@cef-see.org Katja Kerschbaumer THE WORLD BANK 1818 H Street, NW, Washington, DC 20433, USA Tel. +11 202 458 4856, Fax. +202 477 0574 E-mail: kkerschbaumer@worldbank.org |
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