Healthcare in the right place
Close to home or further away? Carry out a treatment or have it done to you? Each of the umcs in the Netherlands has a task of care in their own region. But their care extends much further than that.
Like a spider in its web, they manage national or local networks for geriatric care or cancer treatments, for example. They are also the designated place for people needing very specialist care (tertiary referrals) or who have a rare disease.
In close collaboration with the patient, general hospitals, patient organisations and other concerned parties, the umcs strive to provide the best care environment for every patient. They do this in different ways:
- Citrienfonds: in four programmes and over 100 projects, the Citrienfonds (funding agency) works on the right care with the right information in the right place
- Oncology Taskforce: an active group of care professionals who advise about the best care for cancer patients.
- Rare disorders: the umcs are the designated place for researching and treating rare disorders.
- Palliative care: the umcs ensure that people suffer the least pain and worries in the last phase of their life.
- Acute care: receiving appropriate care in the right place within 45 minutes. That is the rule with acute care, e.g. during the COVID-19 pandemic.
- Tertiary referral care: sometimes the existing medical knowledge cannot provide a solution. What can be done in that case? The umcs offer a last resort – safe haven – for tertiary referral patients.
