Health system performance assessment in the WHO European Region: which domains and indicators have been used by Member States for its measurement?
Publication year: 2018
Health systems performance assessment (HSPA) varies across the WHO European Region. This review summarizes HSPA domains and indicators used by Member States in their HSPA or health system-related reports. Thirty Member States published in the English language and from their latest documents, 1485 distinct indicators were extracted. The number of indicators reported per Member State ranged from 9 to 146, with a mean of 50. Among the 14 domains of the WHO 2007 framework, service delivery and improved health were covered by virtually all Member States analysed (30 and 29, respectively), but coverage varied for the other 12 domains, with health workforce and financing having good coverage (25 and 26, respectively) but others, such as safety, efficiency, coverage or responsiveness, covered in only 20–30% of documents. Further refinement of frameworks, both in clarity on scope and function and in the conceptual robustness of domains, is warranted and further standardization of generic sets of indicators should be sought.