Health care|In the fall, Länsi-Uusimaa will start testing a model where the doctor working at the health center is an entrepreneur.
In the medical association we welcome with joy the experiment starting in the fall of Western Uusimaa, where a doctor works as a practitioner at the health center. That is, in practice, as a self-employed entrepreneur who is given the responsibility of a certain group of patients at the Kalajärvi health center in Espoo.
The joy comes from the fact that the model is one way to arrange for people to have a family doctor they are familiar with. On the other hand, it is not yet certain whether bringing professionals to the health center is the best way to do this.
“I am really happy that this is being tried in Western Uusimaa. It is important to gather experiences on whether this is a suitable model for today,” says the director of the union’s policy department Jukka Mattila.
Mattila says she hopes that Länsi-Uusimaa has done the background work on the legal boundary conditions carefully enough so that the experiment does not run into technical difficulties. By this he refers to taxation. That is, whether a doctor working in the premises of a health center can certainly be treated here like an entrepreneur.
Secondly, Mattila is interested in whether Finnish doctors are more excited about the idea of working as a practitioner at a health center.
Practitioners has been in Finnish public health care for the last time in the early 70s.
There are, for example, modern examples in other Nordic countries, but even their successes cannot be directly copied to Finland. Mattila says that she just met guests from this much-praised Denmark, but they were in the village to learn about Finnish health care. It’s about exchanging ideas more than copying.
Many doctors nowadays prefer to work as a practitioner in their own premises or at a medical center. It cannot be compared to the model of Western Uusimaa.
A practitioner working at a medical center can limit the number of his patients himself, at a health center he is responsible for a certain population.
So it is still not possible to know whether there will be a rush of doctors to the health center in Espoo.
Its instead, many doctors are excited about the idea of an in-house doctor, the Medical Association assures. Many specifically want to treat familiar patients. Continuity of treatment has been proven to mean better treatment for the patient.
“From the point of view of the medical association, it doesn’t matter whether it is a private doctor in an official or employment relationship or a professional practitioner. But that’s why I’m happy that the concept has made its way into political decision-making as well,” says Mattila.
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