JANUARY

ISRAEL
• Addressing the unique needs of cultural and linguistic minorities, through adoption of cultural responsiveness
requirements for all providers, establishment of a national translation call center, and targeted interventions for
the Bedouin and other high-risk groups.
• Intersectoral efforts to address the social determinants of health and promote healthy lifestyles.
• Creation, analysis, and public dissemination of information about health care disparities, including periodic
reporting of variations in health and health care access.
What is being done to promote delivery system integration and
care coordination?
The health plans, which are both insurers and providers, are essentially the sole source of primary care and the
main source of specialty care. This structural integration of services provides the foundation for provision of
relatively seamless care for all the insured, including complex and chronically ill patients. The plans’ health
information systems link primary and specialty care providers, and a new national health information exchange
is linking the health plans and the hospitals. Increasingly these provide access to electronic medical information
at the point of care.
In addition, the health plans have put forth several targeted management programs that aim to provide
comprehensive integrated care for complex patients with chronic conditions. These make extensive use of the
plans’ sophisticated information systems, videoconferencing, and other innovative techniques (Intel, 2015).
Generally speaking, integration is still limited among the various components of the long-term care system and
between long-term care and other components of the health care system. However, this may change in the
future if long-term care becomes a responsibility of the health plans (see below).
What is the status of electronic health records?
All health plans have electronic health record (EHR) systems that link all community-based providers—primary
care physicians, specialists, laboratories, and pharmacies. All GPs work with an EHR. Hospitals are also
computerized but are not fully integrated with health plan EHRs. The MoH leads a major national health
information exchange project to create a system for sharing relevant information across all hospitals and
health plans.
Each citizen has a unique identification number, which functions as a unique patient ID. Patients have the right
to get copies of their medical records from hospitals and health plans, and patients can access some
components of their EHR online, but the full records are not generally available. Efforts are under way to set up
secure messaging systems linking patients and their GPs.
How are costs contained?
Israel is one of the most successful high-income countries in containing costs, with health expenditures
remaining below 8 percent of GDP. Strategies include:
• Channeling the bulk of funding through a single, tightly controlled, government source
• Maintaining tight controls on key supply factors, such as hospital beds and expensive medical equipment
• Requiring the health plans—which function as the building blocks of the health system—to provide care
competitively, within budgets that are largely determined prospectively
• Maintaining a well-developed system of community-based services, which reduces reliance on high-cost
hospital care
International Profiles of Health Care Systems, 2015 93