Building a digital care and support plan: research as a starting point. A session for policymakers.

Abstract

In 2018, the idea arose of building a digital care and support plan for primary care. The research on life goals and care goals during the COVID years allowed us to clarify informed choices in the ICT specifications and digital development can start in 2023.
 The reform of the primary care in Flanders envisioned a digital capstone. Therefore, a business analysis for a digital care and support plan was prepared in 2018. This digital care plan should:
 * facilitate goal-oriented and integrated care, 
 * give individuals with care and support needs control over their care planning, and 
 * allow care providers to collaborate interdisciplinary and coordinate their care within the care team. 
 The scope and associated resources were largely lacking at that time, and the subsequent COVID crisis prevented the project from even starting at all. 
 We used this pause to engage academia. We asked them what goal-oriented care might look like in practice: 
 * How do you integrate life goals into care planning? 
 * Can you create links between life goals and care goals?
 * In what ways can you link care goals to existing care scales? 
 The researchers' recommendations to these questions, gave us a clearer view of the possibilities and scope of our project. This information helped us to:
 * Write a clearer ICT specification
 * Clearly define the functional requirements
 * Propose an evidence-based approach to stakeholders
 * Prioritize the different digital modules to be developed
 * Engaging academics in a technical debate
 Do not underestimate the impact of sound research. Do not rush into an ICT project without fundamentally questioning the content and scope of the project. Consult academics who will work out the concepts in a research context with people in the field. Then build on this input.
 The inputs from the research questions are currently being used as a starting point for the digital modules on life goals and care goals. These modules are now being further refined with stakeholders and will serve as a starting point for ICT development this year.