“I Witness Countless Wonders Unfold in Healthcare Each Day”

‘In recent years, of corona, healthcare has been in the news all the time. It was about a shortage of beds, overloaded staff, an imminent care infarction; about medical treatments and care that would become unaffordable.

“I thought: I have a future in healthcare, I am learning a lot about illness and health – all very interesting! But why is there so little attention for the organization and financing of care in my studies? Sometimes I see those themes passing by, but it is usually not in-depth.

“On the one hand you have all those bottlenecks. On the other hand, we say, as a society: everyone is entitled to good care. We also know that there are more and more elderly people, which makes healthcare more expensive. At the same time, in the future fewer and fewer young people will be available for training in a medical profession.

“I started talking about this with fellow students. How do we see our future? What problems do we see in the healthcare system? Can we think about solutions?

“We have now set up a foundation to seek answers to those questions. We have the name for this ‘Common Sense Think Tank’ invented. After all, problems in healthcare are not easy to solve. This requires cooperation of people with all kinds of expertise, and patiently sifting through factors that interact with each other. So common sense.

“Our first activity is now on track. In January we set to work with a think tank of twenty students. The group is diverse in composition, with students of medicine, pharmacy, biomedics, psychology, neuropsychology and data science. This way you bring together knowledge from all kinds of perspectives.

“Our first theme is prevention and early diagnosis. For five months, eight hours a week, we work on different issues. We do this in collaboration with a company that wants to contribute to a healthier population. Of course we cannot change the whole care with twenty of us. But in this way we can still contribute, no matter how limited. And we ourselves are getting a broader view of healthcare.

Banners

“Care costs a lot of money. The general picture is that this is being cut back. But it’s not that simple. This year, healthcare expenditure in the Netherlands will rise above one hundred billion: from 97 billion to 103 billion euros. Spending has been growing much faster than the economy for some time now. What does this mean for our future, for my generation?

“Last Thursday, dozens of hospitals went on strike for a better collective labor agreement. I see all kinds of banners hanging from angry healthcare workers when I walk through the hospital now. At the same time, day by day, I see so many beautiful things happening. People work hard to provide good care. I think this deserves more attention. This motivates me to become a doctor. With all these problems, let’s not forget how beautiful healthcare is. That small things can have great meaning for patients. Illness makes people so vulnerable.

“The big challenge will be to organize the care in such a way that more money is not required every year. Then we need to think even better and talk about the human dimension in healthcare, about a healthy lifestyle, about ethical issues such as quality of life and end-of-life, about technological innovations, about organizing healthcare differently.

“These are all issues with which our think tank can continue for years to come.”

In this section: ideas and plans of a new generation. See also: newsletter Future Affairs (register: nrc.nl/futureaffairs).

Recorded by Gijsbert van Es