Half-yearly surveys

In each survey covering six months, partner institutions provided information on the progress of a health policy idea, approach or instrument from the early stage of inception towards implementation over time.

For every six-month-period, our experts described five or more key health policy developments selected according to the criteria mentioned below. We were interested in comparing the background/context of a key health policy issue, its players/process interactions, and, - with a view to implementation - its potential impact.

Reporting criteria

Four criteria were determined to select and describe a health policy development in any half-yearly survey:

• relevance and scope: impact on the status quo of a health care system (legal, financial and organizational framework, entitlements)
• degree of innovation (idea or policy held against national and international standards),
• media coverage / public attention / visibility
• transferability of approach (to determine the extent to which a policy depends on a particular health care system)

For the final rating of a policy, we also looked at the policy process: Was it consensual, or was it highly controversial? While the first survey can only throw a spotlight at these characteristics, over time we were able to relate health policy themes with political interactions. The aim was to facilitate in-depth analyses of the policy making process as such. The HealthPolicyMonitor enabled us to answer questions about the association or relationship between positions, priorities and influences of actors toward a policy on one side, and the outcome of a health policy idea or piece of reform on the other: Which types of negotiation and what incentives or trade-offs are relevant for success, failure or abolition of a reform?