A new international journal addressing variations in health care is now online
“Research in Health Services and Regions” - journal provides a forum for researchers and health care decision makers. The first edition, including three articles and an editorial text, is now online.
Berlin, July 1 – Titled “Research in Health Services and Regions” Springer Nature launches a new scientific journal aimed at filling a relevant health policy gap. Most health systems are meant to provide the same entitlement to care to the population, irrespective of the area of residence. All health systems, however, are struggling with unexplained or unwarranted variations in health care. Analyzing these variations and implementing programs to ensure that all geographies attempt to achieve best practice benchmarks requires current knowledge about variations and the effectiveness of such programs. “Research in Health Services and Regions” now attempts to close this gap and provide a continuous forum for researchers, clinicians and decision makers in this field. Such a knowledge exchange may provide many practical inputs for the continuous improvement of health care structures and processes in different countries. It may also provide counter-intuitive insights. Various health atlases around the world for example have already shown that medical care in sparsely populated regions can be equivalent or better in many respects than in metropolitan areas.
"Research in Health Services and Regions” (RHSR) is an e-only open access journal publishing high-quality scientific original articles, reviews, and brief communications. All manuscripts are peer-reviewed by international experts before publication in a single-blinded process. The first edition, including three articles and an editorial text, is now online. All publications in RHSR are open access, published under a Creative Commons license in which authors retain the copyright of their papers. The journal is sponsored by the Central Research Institute for Ambulatory Health Care in the Federal Republic of Germany (Zi), a not-for-profit tax-exempt research foundation devoted to research in support of universal access to health care. Zi covers the publication costs and article processing charges for up 30 papers p.a. No article processing charges or fees apply. All published papers are made freely and permanently accessible online, without subscription fees or registration barriers, providing immediate and equitable access to information.
“Most patients expect to receive the same standard of care no matter where they live or access the health care system. But unwarranted variations remain a fact in all health care systems across the world. In order to improve both the quality and efficiency of health care, we are constantly challenged to measure and address these variations. In this regard, we can all continuously learn from international experience. From our own studies, we know that Germany can also make interesting contributions. So far, however, publications in this field have yet to find a specific medium. That is why we are promoting the development of such a format," says Zi’s Executive Director, Dominik von Stillfried. He is one of four Editors-in-Chief of the journal together with Dr. Stef Groenewoud (Radboud Institute for Health Sciences; Nijmwegen, The Netherlands), Dr. Daniela Koller (Ludwigs Maximilians Universität Munich, Germany), and Dr. Thérèse Stukel (IC/ES; Toronto, Canada). An international team of renowned specialists contributes as members of the editorial board and as peer-reviewers.
"We are accepting qualified submissions on an ongoing basis. Currently, the call for papers is underway on our core theme – variations in health care systems – as well as on the collections 'Lessons of the Pandemic - How the pandemic affects our health care system' and 'The Future of Health Care Atlases'. We welcome sound research that directly addresses geographic disparities in health care, benchmarking based on best practices, and health care system improvements that take into account regional characteristics. We are also interested in reports on the implementation of relevant health policies or local initiatives to improve patient care," says von Stillfried.
Visit our website and get to know more about our aims and scope at https://www.springer.com/journal/43999
Press contact
Daniel Wosnitzka
Head of Communications / Press Officer
Tel: 030 – 4005 2449
Mobil: 0177 – 852 02 04
presse@zi.de
Wissenschaftlicher Ansprechpartner:
Camila Gonzatto: cgonzattodasilva@zi.de
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