Qualitative improvement of the functional role of regional health authorities: The model of interconnectivity

Regional Health Authorities (DYPEs) are crucial for the governance of the Health System and effective management of the health-care units (hospitals and primary health care services). The DYPEs were initially created in an attempt to decentralize the Greek National Health System by implementing regional organization and administration of the health services. DYPEs have been renamed, and renumbered, and have evolved through a sequence of legislative Acts (no 2889/2001, 3106/2003, and 3329/2005) established by a series of governments. The current functional model of DYPE is parallel to that of the Decentralized Administrations of the Greek Public Administration, an organizational level additional to that of Administrative Regions, which, in practice, has been excessively bureaucratic, slow and ineffective. In this context, to date, the DYPEs have played an undetermined role in regional health service management and the control and implementation of the national budget and other funding programmes. This paper presents a novel functional model of DYPEs, based on interconnectivity with the 13 Greek Administrative Regions, which would allow more flexible and productive management of the public health services.