The drive to create expanded access for patients is also increasingly anchored on systematic public-private partnerships (PPPs). FILE PHOTO | SHUTTERSTOCK
In a precedence setting move, Kisumu County has partnered with Oasis Doctors Plaza; a private entity in a five-year renewable contract to manage Victoria Sub–County Hospital; a peri-urban health facility.
The reported deal involves Oasis injecting a 236 million shillings capital investment with an initial infrastructural improvement costing 50 million shillings. The expected outcomes of the project include improvement of clinical services quality and increasing access to specialized services.
Such an innovative move is not only timely but can also provide key lessons on how to furnish public-private partnership models in healthcare. The move is timely because Kenya is currently aggressively pursuing a universal health coverage agenda.
Also, the country is witnessing a burgeoning of different healthcare service provision models in the private sector. This includes an emergence of corporate hospitals and large network outpatient facilities leverage on economies of scale to lower the cost of healthcare.
More importantly, such public-private partnerships can provide opportunities for cross-learning and experience sharing around operations excellence, clinical quality improvement, efficiency, data insights and client satisfaction that the private sector is well-known for.
The public sector can provide key lessons on providing affordable healthcare at scale for large catchment populations.
Having previously worked in both secondary and tertiary level health facilities in Kisumu County and also in the private sector, I can immediately envision an opportunity for this announced partnership to layer its service provision model on the already existent healthcare solidarity fund.
This layering will enable citizenry that are insured under the fund to gain access to versatile clinical services without incurring out-of-pocket expenditure.
As such partnerships are forged, it would be prudent to align them with the Public Private Partnerships Act. The Act provides guidance on projects identification, selection of private parties, soliciting of bids, transitioning among other ambits. This would ensure that the partnerships uphold public interest and that the engagements are transparent.
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