Integration of Health Care and Social Care by Technology

Abstract

The potential of ICT-enabled forms of support for health care, social care, informal care, and self-care can be exploited in a radically more effective way if these were more systematically embedded within a continuum of care approach. Integrated care should be regarded as a complex ecosystem of organizations, caregivers, technologies, and care recipients who are all interdependent. But the most important aspect is that the focus is on the individual care recipient. In order to make integrated care a reality, several research initiatives address this complex task by using different starting points. Initiatives focus on acceptance by users, the use of service platforms, electronic health records, cooperation between health and social care, supporting the role of the informal caregiver, and public procurement of innovations. Projects have in common that they are all focusing on the organizational changes needed to overcome barriers that currently prevent large-scale rollout and to build the critical mass needed to live up to the expectations raised by the results of small-scale pilots. This chapter presents the result of a literature review and several years of experience in carrying out the before-mentioned research projects.