Evidence

The World Health Organization recently announced that shifting towards value-based health services (VBHS) is an inherent part of the aspiration to achieve Universal Health Coverage (UHC). Value based health services are defined as the effort to include patients, families, health professionals, communities and societies as a whole value most in relation to health care. This includes ensuring and tracking health improvement at the patient level, responsiveness of the health system to patient needs, financial protection, efficiency and equity. This is especially important as cost of healthcare continues to rise and health budgets are stretched at individual and country levels. This policy brief presents a framework for VBHS that links the policy instruments of value for money in health benefit package selection processes and strategic purchasing to enable integrated people-centered health services (IPCHS) approaches. It outlines several approaches for ensuring VBHS, including, (i) value through health benefit package selection processes, (ii) value through strategic purchasing from healthcare providers, and (iii) value through an integrated people-centred health services approach (IPCHS). This policy brief can assist countries and implementing organizations to embed and deploy VBHS mechanisms in the overall health system. 

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