This paper reports on the progress in the research and development of the set of patient safety indicators developed by the Health Care Quality Indicators project. The indicators presented here have been recommended by an expert group for further...

This paper represents an attempt to set out a conceptual framework for the OECD’s Health Care Quality Indicator (HCQI) Project. Two main issues are tackled: what concepts, or dimensions, of quality of health care should be measured and how, in...

The OECD Health Care Quality Indicator (HCQI) Project was started in 2001. The long-term objective of the HCQI Project is to develop a set of indicators that can be used to raise questions for further investigation concerning quality of health care...

This paper reports on a project to improve the comparability and availability of private health expenditure under the joint health accounts questionnaire (JHAQ) data collection. The JHAQ is a framework for joint data collection in the area of health...

Doctors are distributed unequally across different regions in virtually all OECD countries, and this causes concern about how to continue to ensure access to health services everywhere. In particular access to services in rural regions is the focus...

Across the OECD, healthcare spending has typically outpaced economic growth in recent decades. While such spending has improved health outcomes, there are concerns about the financial sustainability of this upward trend, particularly as healthcare...

Two of the most important health risk factors for children and young adults are obesity and alcohol use. These risk factors are known to affect health and wellbeing, but may also have an impact on educational outcomes. The objective of this study was...

Waiting times for elective surgery are a significant health policy concern in approximately half of all OECD countries. The main objectives of the OECD Waiting Times project were to: i) review policy initiatives to reduce waiting times in 12 OECD...

Assessing the direct and indirect health impact of the COVID 19 pandemic is central in managing public health and other policy measures while learning to co-exist with the virus. Many countries are publishing statistics on COVID 19 related mortality....

Digital technologies offer unique opportunities to strengthen health systems. However, the digital infrastructure only provide the tools, which on their own cannot transform the health systems, but need to be put to productive use by health workers....

Emergency departments are the front line of health care systems and play a critical role in ensuring an efficient and high-quality response for patients in stress or crisis situations. A growing demand for emergency care might however reduce...

Sometimes it is argued that the content of a reform is less important in determining whether or not it receives public and legislative approval than the timing of the proposal; the way in which the reform is presented; the discussions with...

An epidemic of obesity has been developing in virtually all OECD countries over the last 30 years. Existing evidence provides strong suggestions that such epidemic has affected certain social groups more than others. In particular, education appears...

Prevalence of non-communicable diseases has increased in past decades in the OECD. These conditions have many risk factors, including poor quality diet, insufficient physical activity, and excess sedentarism. These behaviours are also at the root of...

This paper provides a description of the classification systems used to measure hospital services in selected OECD countries: Australia, Canada, France, Germany, Norway, United Kingdom (England), and the United States. Three classifications are...

Dementia and its most common manifestation, Alzheimer’s disease, is a complex disorder that afflicts primarily the elderly, affecting an estimated 10 million people in OECD member countries. The complexity of the disease makes treating dementia...

Health care expenditure per person, after accounting for changes in overall price levels, began to slow in many OECD countries in the early-to-mid 2000s, well before the economic and fiscal crisis. Using available estimates from the OECD’s System of...

Physical inactivity and sedentary behaviours have been rising throughout the OECD in recent decades. Lack of physical activity and excessive sedentary behaviour are well-known risk factors for non-communicable diseases, such as heart diseases,...

While health care quality has been improving on average in OECD members countries, patient safety remains a central priority for policy makers and health care leaders. A growing research body has found that PSC is associated with numerous positive...

As the number of older persons in need of long-term care increases, efforts to support older persons remaining in their home are intensified in most OECD countries. In this context of ageing in place, there is a movement towards allowing more...