Paul on Coproduction

Distilling many years of experience examining the different applications of the coproduction of healthcare service in diverse settings, Paul Batalden describes a way of understanding its key components. He shares some of the knowledge, skills and habits that contribute to coproducing a healthcare service along with the implications and benefits of new framing to improve health care overall

Supplementary material

Reading

Batalden P. Getting more health from healthcare: quality improvement must acknowledge patient coproduction—an essay by Paul Batalden. BMJ 2018;362:k3617 doi: 10.1136/bmj.k3617 (Published 6 September 2018)

Many studies are emerging showing the effect of acknowledging the partnership. One example: Asch DA, et al. Effect of Financial Incentives to Physicians, Patients, or Both on Lipid Levels: A Randomized Clinical Trial. JAMA. 2015;314(18):1926-1935. doi:10.1001/jama.2015.14850

Self-study

a. Think of a time when healthcare service worked really well:

  1. What happened?
  2. What did the “professional-person” do (sometimes only called by the name of their “role”, for example “nurse” or “physician”), that contributed to the experience?
  3. What did the “patient-person” do (sometimes called by the name of their “role”, for example “patient” or “parent”), that contributed to the experience?

b. Pushing a little further into that time and getting even a bit more specific, if we think of a healthcare service as a relationship and an action:

  1. What did the “professional-person” do that contributed to a meaningful relationship?
  2. What did the “patient-person” do that contributed to a meaningful relationship?
  3. And the same questions for a helpful set of actions…what did each party/actor do that contributed to the plan for and the carrying out of the planned actions?

c. What resources and supports helped the two parties work together to make the service?

d. What might make healthcare service work like this difficult to do consistently?