National Plan
How can we keep improving our health care? And how do we keep care affordable? These questions are key in the National Plan, the umcs’ translation of the National Science Agenda.
The keywords for a sustainable health care: collaboration and innovation
At least a quarter of the 12,000 questions from the general public for the National Science Agenda concerned health and innovation in the care sector. It’s a strong signal from society, and the umcs have taken direct action on it.
Science as driving force
On 10 February 2016 Minister Bussemaker from the Ministry for Education, Culture and Science received the National Plan for Academic Health, Biomedical Science and Health Care Research. With this plan the umcs responded to many questions from society about health and care for the National Science Agenda. In the Netherlands the umcs are responsible for the majority of research in this field. They have responded jointly, with their National Plan, to this strong signal from society. The plan describes how the umcs are taking the initiative with innovative scientific research to find solutions for one of the greatest societal challenges of this age: how can we keep improving our health care while keeping it affordable?
Step forwards
The plan was arranged in close collaboration between the deans of the umcs and is partly based on the contributions of dozens of lecturers. Minister Bussemaker said about the plan, “This is precisely what I had envisioned for the National Science Agenda: finding scientific answers through new partnerships to questions that society is concerned about. This could represent an enormous step forwards in the search for sustainable health care.”
