IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/hepoli/v126y2022i5p382-390.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Providing health services effectively during the first wave of COVID-19: A cross-country comparison on planning services, managing cases, and maintaining essential services

Author

Listed:
  • Webb, Erin
  • Hernández-Quevedo, Cristina
  • Williams, Gemma
  • Scarpetti, Giada
  • Reed, Sarah
  • Panteli, Dimitra

Abstract

The COVID-19 pandemic triggered abrupt challenges for health care providers, requiring them to simultaneously plan for and manage a rise of COVID-19 cases while maintaining essential health services. Since March 2020, the COVID-19 Health System Response Monitor, a joint initiative of the European Observatory on Health Systems and Policies, the WHO Regional Office for Europe, and the European Commission, has documented country responses to COVID-19 using a structured template which includes a section on provision of care. Using the information available on the platform, this paper analyzes how countries planned services for potential surge capacity, designed patient flows ensuring separation between COVID-19 and non-COVID-19 patients, and maintained routine services in both hospital and ambulatory settings. Despite very real differences in the organization of health and care services, there were many similarities in country responses. These include transitioning the management of COVID-19 mild cases from hospitals to outpatient settings, increasing the use of remote consultations, and cancelling or postponing non-urgent services during the height of the first wave. In the immediate future, countries will have to continue balancing care for COVID-19 and non-COVID-19 patients to minimize adverse health outcomes, ideally with supporting guidelines and COVID-19-specific care zones. Looking forward, policymakers will have to consider whether strategies adopted during the COVID-19 pandemic will become permanent features of care provision.

Suggested Citation

  • Webb, Erin & Hernández-Quevedo, Cristina & Williams, Gemma & Scarpetti, Giada & Reed, Sarah & Panteli, Dimitra, 2022. "Providing health services effectively during the first wave of COVID-19: A cross-country comparison on planning services, managing cases, and maintaining essential services," Health Policy, Elsevier, vol. 126(5), pages 382-390.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:hepoli:v:126:y:2022:i:5:p:382-390
    DOI: 10.1016/j.healthpol.2021.04.016
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0168851021001147
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.healthpol.2021.04.016?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Callard, Felicity & Perego, Elisa, 2021. "How and why patients made Long Covid," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 268(C).
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Turner, Melody & Beckwith, Helen & Spratt, Tanisha & Vallejos, Elvira Perez & Coughlan, Barry, 2023. "The #longcovid revolution: A reflexive thematic analysis," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 333(C).
    2. Jacqueline A. Krysa & Sidney Horlick & Kiran Pohar Manhas & Katharina Kovacs Burns & Mikayla Buell & Maria J. Santana & Kristine Russell & Elizabeth Papathanassoglou & Chester Ho, 2023. "Accessing Care Services for Long COVID Sufferers in Alberta, Canada: A Random, Cross-Sectional Survey Study," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 20(15), pages 1-14, July.
    3. Matthew Whitaker & Joshua Elliott & Marc Chadeau-Hyam & Steven Riley & Ara Darzi & Graham Cooke & Helen Ward & Paul Elliott, 2022. "Persistent COVID-19 symptoms in a community study of 606,434 people in England," Nature Communications, Nature, vol. 13(1), pages 1-10, December.
    4. Daniel M. Altmann & Catherine J. Reynolds & George Joy & Ashley D. Otter & Joseph M. Gibbons & Corinna Pade & Leo Swadling & Mala K. Maini & Tim Brooks & Amanda Semper & Áine McKnight & Mahdad Noursad, 2023. "Persistent symptoms after COVID-19 are not associated with differential SARS-CoV-2 antibody or T cell immunity," Nature Communications, Nature, vol. 14(1), pages 1-9, December.
    5. Giuseppe Craparo & Valentina Lucia La Rosa & Elena Commodari & Graziella Marino & Michela Vezzoli & Palmira Faraci & Carmelo Mario Vicario & Gabriella Serena Cinà & Morena Colombi & Giuseppe Arcoleo &, 2022. "What Is the Role of Psychological Factors in Long COVID Syndrome? Latent Class Analysis in a Sample of Patients Recovered from COVID-19," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 20(1), pages 1-14, December.
    6. Paul B. Perrin & Daniela Ramos-Usuga & Samuel J. West & Kritzia Merced & Daniel W. Klyce & Anthony H. Lequerica & Laiene Olabarrieta-Landa & Elisabet Alzueta & Fiona C. Baker & Stella Iacovides & Mar , 2022. "Network Analysis of Neurobehavioral Symptom Patterns in an International Sample of Spanish-Speakers with a History of COVID-19 and Controls," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 20(1), pages 1-11, December.
    7. Evan Xu & Yan Xie & Ziyad Al-Aly, 2023. "Long-term gastrointestinal outcomes of COVID-19," Nature Communications, Nature, vol. 14(1), pages 1-10, December.
    8. Roth, Phillip H. & Gadebusch-Bondio, Mariacarla, 2022. "The contested meaning of “long COVID” – Patients, doctors, and the politics of subjective evidence," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 292(C).
    9. Rohitash Chandra & Ayush Jain & Divyanshu Singh Chauhan, 2022. "Deep learning via LSTM models for COVID-19 infection forecasting in India," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 17(1), pages 1-28, January.
    10. Sætra, Henrik Skaug, 2022. "The ethics of trading privacy for security: The multifaceted effects of privacy on liberty and security," Technology in Society, Elsevier, vol. 68(C).
    11. Leoni-Johanna Speichert & Adam Schweda & Oliver Witzke & Margarethe Konik & Hana Rohn & Mark Stettner & Venja Musche & Klaas Herchert & Madeleine Fink & Sheila Geiger & Alexander Bäuerle & Eva-Maria S, 2022. "Fear of Death during COVID-19 Does Not Explain Post-Infection Depression Symptoms beyond Reported Symptoms during the Infection in COVID-19 Survivors," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 19(21), pages 1-10, October.
    12. Mullard, Jordan C.R. & Kawalek, Jessica & Parkin, Amy & Rayner, Clare & Mir, Ghazala & Sivan, Manoj & Greenhalgh, Trisha, 2023. "Towards evidence-based and inclusive models of peer support for long covid: A hermeneutic systematic review," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 320(C).
    13. Sarah Houben & Bruno Bonnechère, 2022. "The Impact of COVID-19 Infection on Cognitive Function and the Implication for Rehabilitation: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 19(13), pages 1-21, June.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:hepoli:v:126:y:2022:i:5:p:382-390. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu or the person in charge (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/healthpol .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.