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Discussion and c
onclusions
Chapt
er 9
Summary
240
Putting the elderly care client rather than the care supplier at the center of long-term
care processes and structures has been advocated by academics, politicians, and policy
makers in various proposals on future care provision. However, how providers of
long-term care for the elderly can actually provide demand-based care and services
in their day-to-day practices and activities remains somewhat unclear. We chose to
approach this issue from an operations management perspective, thereby focusing
on the primary processes that produce and deliver the products of long-term care
providers. In particular we studied the concept of modularity. Modularity is known as
a good way to bring about customization and client focus, however, it has hardly been
researched in long-term care for the elderly, or in care and service settings in general.
The main purpose of this research therefore was to explore and advance modularity
in long-term care for the elderly. The research aims were to advance knowledge on
modularity beyond manufacturing, and to improve the provision of long-term care for
the elderly and assist the sector in moving towards demand-based care provision.
In the general introduction, as described in
Chapter 1
, a brief overview of background
information is provided. First, it describes the general trends in the care-for-the-elderly
sector that lead providers towards demand-based care provision. Second, the chapter
introduces the field of (service) operations management, and in particular the concept
of modularity and its related aspects, practices and achievements. Third, the chapter
introduces the Dutch sector for long-term care for the elderly and addresses various
characteristics of long-term care clients and their demands that need to be taken into
account when exploring the concept of modularity for this target group. The chapter
ends with stating the overall aim of this study, the research design and the research
questions that will be addressed in this dissertation:
How can demand-based care be brought into practice on the operational
level of care, welfare, and housing provision to elderly clients living
independently?
Whether and how can design decisions contribute to different performance
objectives in long-term care?
How does modularity manifest itself in the specification and construction of
demand-based care and service packages for independently living elderly?
How do interfaces manage the reconfiguration of modular services?
How does personalization contribute to the provision of customized
modular long-term care?
What modularity practices are currently used in long-term care provision
in order to provide demand-based care? In addition, what gaps remain
and how can these be resolved by means of modularity practices?
Modular Care Provision
241
To address the question ‘How can demand-based care be brought into practice on
the operational level of care, welfare, and housing provision to elderly clients living
independently?’ we present an operationalization of demand-based care in
Chapter
2
. To provide care and related services in a demand-based manner, we identified four
dimensions to be taken into account simultaneously: choice, variation, client interaction,
and joint delivery. Thereafter, we explored conceptually how the achievement of these
dimensions can be supported by means of service operations management concepts,
in particular modularity. To this end, literature on modularity reflecting its various
aspects (components, modules, interfaces, packages) and practices (e.g. mix-and-
match, package configuration, package reconfiguration) as well as its various fields
of application (i.e. manufacturing, services, and health care) was studied. Modularity
would be helpful in achieving choice, variation, and joint delivery of care packages
through the provision of relatively standardized components and modules that can
be combined in many ways by means of standardized interfaces. At the same time,
modularity could support the exploitation of analogies among elderly clients and
thereby conceptually allows for efficient provision of care and service packages, which
is another pressing factor faced by care providers. In addition to modularity, front
office-back office configurations could allow the client to be actively involved in the
care process. At the same time they might allow professionals to manage and control
client interaction in this process when needed to support efficiency. We conclude that,
conceptually speaking, the operational system, when set up in a modular fashion,
seems promising in assisting care organizations in providing their elderly clients with
demand-based care and service offerings without a rise in costs. The concept thereby
enables the elaboration of the operational implications of demand-based care and
putting client demand at the centre of care and service provision.
Chapter 3
presents the results of a pilot study that was conducted to explore the
feasibility of OM concepts in care for the elderly and thereby addresses the research
question ‘Whether and how can design decisions contribute to different performance
objectives in long-term care?’ To achieve particular strategic performance objectives,
such as client orientation, speed, efficiency, and quality, decisions can be made regarding
the optimal design for service processes. Based on demand characteristics (diversity
in demand and complexity of demand), we presented four design configurations from
which long-term care providers can choose to design their specification process. In this
process it is determined which care and related service parts can and will be provided
to each client. All configurations aimed to do well in terms of client orientation and
efficiency, but differed in the way in which they bring this into practice: tasks performed
in the presence and absence of the elderly client and the combination (coupling
or decoupling) of different activities within one job. Empirical exploration of the
proposed configurations showed that insight in actual client demand was important
Summar
y
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