Operational Programme Health 2007-2013

The Operational Programme Health (OPH) is a programming document of the Slovak Republic (SR) for drawing assistance from funds of the European Union (EU) for the healthcare sector for the 2007 - 2013 period. It contains the strategy, aims and also defines years-long measures to attain them, which are to be carried out with the help of national funds and of the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF). On the basis of Government Resolution of the SR No. 832/2006 of 8 October 2006, the Managing Authority for the OPH is the Ministry of Health of the Slovak Republic. The OPH has been elaborated on the basis of Council Regulation (EC) No 1083/2006 laying down general provisions on the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF), the European Social Fund (ESF) and the Cohesion Fund (CF) and repealing Regulation (EC) No 1260/1999, and of Regulation (EC) No 1080/2006 of the European Parliament and of the Council on the ERDF and repealing Regulation (EC) No 1783/1999. Under the 'Convergence' objective, supported can be on the level NUTS II, i. e. their 2000 - 2002 gross domestic product (hereinafter referred to as 'GDP') per capita measured by purchasing power parity is less than 75% of the Community average. All regions of NUTS II of the Slovak Republic (Western, Central and Eastern Slovakia) except for the Bratislava region fulfil this condition. The West Slovak region consists of the following self-governing regions (NUTS III): Trnava region (TT), Trencin region (TN), Nitra region (NR); The Central Slovak Region consists of the following self-governing regions (NUTS III): Banska Bystrica region and Zilina region; The East Slovak Region consists of the following self-governing regions (NUTS III): Presov region and Kosice region. The OPH strategy creates conditions for the convergence of the SR towards the EU level in the area of healthcare. Concurrently, it helps considerably to keep the overall SR economy convergence to the EU-15 average in line with sustainable development. The OPH ties up with the objectives and priorities of the National Strategic Reference Framework 2007 - 2013 (NSRF) as the basic programming document of the SR for cohesion and regional policies, whereas the OPH implements and details the specific priority of the NSRF 'Modernisation of Healthcare Infrastructure'. The introduction part of the document shortly describes the process of document preparation, partnership principle implementation, the results of ex-ante evaluation and of the strategic environmental assessment. The analytical part of the document provides information about the population health condition in the SR, health care system (hereinafter HCS), health infrastructure, material-technical base and equipment of inpatient and outpatient healthcare providers in the SR. Results of analyses together with the experiences of the programming period 2004 - 2006, the SWOT analyses, definition of the main disparities and development factors are the backgrounds for identification, specification of needs and strategic directing of the investments from the ERDF. Strategic plan follows the results of the complex analysis, defines regional focus in the context of and outpatient health infrastructure. The OPH strategy focuses mainly on the development of the conditions necessary for the improvement of quality of the provided healthcare through the modernisation of healthcare infrastructure with the aim to improve the economic effectiveness, strengthen the economic and social cohesion and achieve harmonised, balanced and sustainable development. Fulfilment of this programme context shall bring benefits in the form of diminishing economic, social and regional differences, which arose in the past and are connected with the ongoing economic and social restructuring and with aging of population. At the same time, the convergence of the least developed regions shall accelerate due to improved conditions within the innovation and cohesion growth poles and thanks to increased and improved quality of effective healthcare that would be financially sustainable in relation to public financing and thus would have a positive impact on human capital development and on employment. With regard to the identified needs of the healthcare infrastructure of the SR, the individual OPH priority axes are defined within the next part. Priority axis 1 - Hospital healthcare system modernisation Priority axis 2 - Health promotion and health risks prevention Priority axis 3 - Technical assistance In the text is specified the focus and justification of priority axes through which the OPH shall be implemented, objectives and framework activities together with the indicators on the OPH and individual priority axis level. Horizontal priorities of the NSRF, complementarity and the borderlines together with other operational programmes are elaborated and described in the following chapters of the OPH. Within the framework of the whole financial allocation of the SR for the 2007 - 2013 period, the amount of 250,000,000 EUR is allocated for the 'Convergence' objective. On the basis of the defined obligatory level of co-financing of the SR, the objective allocation of the EU funds shall be supplemented from national public sources (from the state budget and budget of the self-governments). The implementation part describes the OPH implementation system pursuant to Council Regulation (EC) No. 1083/2006 in accordance with the SF and CF Management System for the programming period of 2007 - 2013 and in accordance with other related documents. This part defines the authorities involved in the programme management and implementation, system of monitoring, evaluation, publicity, financial management, control and audit. (author)