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Modular care and service packages
for independently living elderly
This chapter is based on:
De Blok, C., Luijkx, K., Meijboom, B., Schols, J. (2010).
Modular care and service
packages for independently
living elderly. International Journal of Operations and
Production
Management, 30 (1), pp. 75- 97.
91
Pekkarinen and Ulkuniemi (2008) developed a model for a modular service platform
in business services. By means of modularization, they show how business service
providers can identify, develop and deliver new services in a cost-efficient and
flexible manner. Therefore, in a service setting modularity can also be seen as a way
to develop services and manage heterogeneity in demand without major cost increases
(Pekkarinen and Ulkuniemi, 2008).
A specific service context in which organizations have to align customization and
efficiency goals is the field of healthcare. In the developed world, governments have
been reforming their healthcare systems to cope with the challenges posed by, among
others, the ageing populations (De Gooijer, 2007). On the one hand, systems are
created in which patients and clients are given a central position. Various terms are
used to describe this increasing consideration for healthcare clients (e.g. McLaughlin
and Kaluzny, 2000, Herzlinger, 2004, Rijckmans, 2005); here, we define this as a
trend towards demand-based care. On the other hand, providers of care are urged to
decrease their costs of operation (Post and Kagan, 1998, Breedveld et al., 2006). Also
in the Dutch system, suppliers of care and related services are encouraged to be more
responsive towards the needs and desires of their (primarily) elderly clients but without
an increase in the costs of care and service production (Van der Kraan and Van der
Grinten, 2004, Bosselaar, 2005).
To balance the focus on clients and efficiency, first steps have been made towards the
application of modularity in the field of care (e.g. Bohmer, 2005, De Blok et al., 2009).
However, because the context of care provision differs from a manufacturing context,
an adaptation of the concept is necessary. By focusing on how modular packages come
into existence in the Dutch market for home care and related welfare and domestic
services, we aim to advance modularity theory beyond manufacturing. Therefore, we
address the following question: How does modularity manifest itself in the specification
and construction of demand-based care and service packages for independently living
elderly?
In elderly care, until now modularity has been discussed from a rather static point
of view, focusing mainly on the required composition of care and related service
components to form modular packages (De Blok et al., 2007). To develop a more
complete and dynamic view on care modularity, we take the specification and
construction of a package of required care and related service components as our unit
of analysis; we call this the specification process. Knowledge on the particularities and
characteristics of the creation of the care package is important to explore extensions
on the concept of modularity in goods production. Since research on service and
care modularity is at an early stage, for the present study we take the work of Duray
et al. (2000) on modularity as a starting point. Despite its manufacturing focus, their
M
odular car
e
and ser
vic
e pack
ages f
or independen
tly
living elder
ly
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