IT suppliers Curavista, Health Cloud Initiative (HCI) and Topicus have won the tender for the Personal Health Platform (PGO). The three may continue to develop the functionality in the coming years with financial support from the government.
"This selection is an important recognition of our expertise, strategy and our joining forces as pioneers in personal health environments," Health Cloud Initiative (HCI) commented. "This milestone is the result of collaboration within HCI, in which Your Care Online and Quli play a crucial role. By combining our areas of expertise, we realize innovative and
scalable solutions that contribute to a digital healthcare landscape in which patients and caregivers are optimally supported."
"This is a great opportunity to shape the PBM landscape of the future and make it as easy as possible for patients to access their health data," responds Harald Dannenberg, business line manager Patient at Topicus, which is developing the Talk Hour PBM.
Robust facility
HCI is also eager to put its shoulders to the wheel. "The selection by VWS offers HCI not only the opportunity to contribute to the future of the MedMij system, but also to ensure that patients and healthcare providers can take full advantage of a digital healthcare environment. Our joint goal is to further develop the MedMij system into a user-friendly and robust facility, which truly puts patients at the center of their own healthcare network."
Setting sail
Until last year, eighteen more PBM providers were subsidized by VWS. Too many to speed up the progress of the PBM pathway, according to VWS. To reduce the number of suppliers and thus enable them to make volume, VWS replaced the ongoing subsidy scheme with a tender process, aiming for three preferred suppliers. The three winners and the dropouts were notified by VWS this week.
Objection
Completely finished, the race is not yet over. Dropouts can formally object to the outcome of the tender procedure. This procedure was previously delayed for months because several suppliers used objection clauses. Objectors may find additional arguments in a recent report by the Advisory Committee on ICT Assessment (AcICT).
Criticism ICT Review Advisory Board
In this report, the Advisory Board is critical of the procurement procedure. The Advisory Board is surprised that "demonstrable experience relevant to improving the MedMij system has not been requested" in the tender procedure, while the Ministry of Health, Welfare and Sport wants to select suppliers who can help improve the user-friendliness of the system. Means and end do not match up in the tender either, the advisory board notes. The decrease in the number of suppliers, the advisory board expects, will ultimately "reduce the innovative power - and thus potentially the ease of use and added value of PBMs."
International profiling
The outcome of the tender does not mean that the curtain has fallen for those PBM providers who do not receive a contract. Even without a contract, they may continue to operate, albeit at their own cost and risk. For some providers, this may be the final blow; others have enough body to continue. For example, with millions of users in the United Kingdom, Patients Know Best (PKB) has considerable clout. Just last week, the English PBM provider, which also operates in the Netherlands, raised £6 million for further development of the platform, partly with a view to further raising its international profile.
This is an article by Dutch Health Hub. Want to keep up with all the news from the healthcare industry? Then take a look at the hub and sign up for the weekly newsletter.
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