Inter-agency services in England and The Netherlands. A comparative study of integrated care development and delivery

In England and the Netherlands there is much comparable experience in developing and delivering integrated services, provided by different health care agencies to people with multiple care demands. The achievement of integrated care provision in such cases appears to be very difficult and laborious in both countries. This article may be considered a first step in exploring the reasons for this and in developing a framework that is not context specific, as a contribution to a more generally applicable analysis of obstacles to integration and the means for overcoming them. After analysing the English and Dutch health and social care systems and their development in recent decades, we conclude that basically there are clear system similarities which are hindering the integration of services, for instance the predominant complexity of the system with a lot of stakeholders having different roles, tasks, interests and power positions. We have identified common mechanisms that play a dominant role in both systems; not only the social, economic and political context, but also the local context, the legal context and funding streams. Other relevant factors are the procedural and structural arrangements at different system levels and the collaborative culture and tradition. The way these mechanisms work in practice, however, is different for England and the Netherlands, due to system differences. In the Netherlands for instance there is a clear emphasis on bargaining in the context of non-hierarchical structured networks, whilst in England hierarchies and the interplay between hierarchies, markets and networks play a more dominant role. In spite of the differences and problems in both countries we have found a similar recognition of interdependence and willingness to pursue integration of services for multi-problem patients.