Dutch healthcare figures under scrutiny

Scaling down care

There were already problems in healthcare before the corona pandemic, but now a healthcare crisis is emerging in the Netherlands. Society is increasingly critical of the role of the government in this, which sometimes seems to go directly against medical specialists, hospital staff and the wishes of patients. A new page in this black chapter in Dutch healthcare is the closure of the (paediatric) heart surgery department of the UMCG and the Center for Congenital Heart Defects Amsterdam-Leiden (CAHAL). In a period in which capacity and accessibility of care are more important than ever, the scaling down of care seems to be at odds with this. Can this development set the tone for healthcare policy that we can expect in the coming years? This article takes a closer look at the figures of Dutch healthcare.

Decrease in number of hospital beds

In recent years there have been more and more signals that healthcare in the Netherlands is being scaled down. To immediately call it a hot topic, the number of available hospital beds is still decreasing every year. In numbers from The State of Health and Care the annual decline in the number of hospital beds is clearly visible. This information goes up to 2018 and counts 39,900 beds that year. From a source of the CBS a number is known for 2019, when there were 38,700 hospital beds. By way of comparison, in 1980 there were 73,100 hospital beds in the Netherlands, almost double the number.

Number of healthcare professions on the rise

The same source from Statistics Netherlands shows that the number of professions in the care sector is increasing sharply. Figures from healthcare professions show that in 2019 there were 12,455 general practitioners in the Netherlands. This is 4,745 more than in 2000. The number of medical specialists also increased from 10,575 in 2000 to 20,850 in 2019, almost doubling. The question that arises is: how can the number of medical specialists increase, while the number of hospital beds is falling? A possible explanation for this could be that the length of hospitalization has decreased: in 2000 the average length of hospital stay was 8.4 days and this had fallen to 5.2 days in 2019.

Use of healthcare

In 2019, 68.7% of the population aged 0 years or older had contact with their GP in the previous 12 months. Remarkable: this is a decrease of 6.9% compared to the year 2000. What about visits to medical specialists? The figures from Statistics Netherlands indicate that in 2000 38% of the surveyed target group made use of specialist care. In 2019, this had increased slightly by 39.9%.

Healthcare costs are rising very fast

Fewer hospital beds, almost a doubling in the number of medical specialists and a decrease in patient days. What effect does that have on healthcare costs? Total health care expenditure was 45.4 billion euros in 2000. In 2010 this rose to 58.8 billion euros and to 116.2 billion euros in 2020. In 20 years, these costs have more than doubled. Given that healthcare costs were already rising sharply before the corona pandemic, it is expected that these will increase even more due to corona. Is there no way to stop this trend?

Deterioration in access to care?

With a healthcare policy that costs the Netherlands considerably more money every year, and in which specialists, hospital staff and patients do not always agree with the government, the dialogue seems to be lost. The argument put forward to centralize cardiac surgery, for example, is to guarantee the quality of care in the future. However, the timing of this decision is particularly unfavourable, especially in a period when the capacity of care leaves something to be desired. To dive into the numbers again, the Heart Foundation speaks on the basis of figures from the Dutch Association for Thoracic Surgery about 4,000 heart patients who have not received treatment since the outbreak of the Covid-19 pandemic due to limited IC capacity.

New initiatives

Now that Dutch healthcare is under heavy pressure, a bright spot is that there are new initiatives. Access to care, new medicines, or for example new treatments for Parkinson’s diseaseheart disease or cancer, are made possible by TheSocialMedwork† They help patients to access medication in a safe and legal way in countries where they are not yet on the market. In today’s healthcare environment where patients are looking for reliable information and appropriate treatments, initiatives such as TheSocialMedwork can provide some relief.

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