Quality of care

Quality of care is essential to achieve final health system goals such as health improvement, financial protection and health system responsiveness. The European Observatory has consistently focused on quality of care, either as an overall concept or on individual strategies aiming to assure or improve it.  

Quality of care is one of the most frequently quoted principles of health policy, and it is a priority on the policy agenda at different levels. The Sustainable Development Goals clearly underline the importance of high quality health services for achieving universal health coverage in a meaningful way: “[Achieve universal health coverage], including financial risk protection, access to quality essential health-care services and access to safe, effective, quality and affordable essential medicines and vaccines for all.” (Goal 3, Target 8). While access to services is of vital importance, better health can only be achieved if the services accessed are also of high quality. 

In line with health policy priorities, the Observatory has worked on specific areas or individual strategies that contribute to quality of healthcare (see some examples below).