Healthcare is in permanent flux with many new actors, instruments, and regulations entering the field. In recent years care arrangements have been decentralized, with municipalities and healthcare organizations more in the lead. Consequently, the position and functioning of the state has changed, especially in their relation to managers, professionals and patients. Think about the rise of patient self-management and shifts in task distribution between professional groups. The question ‘who cares?’ can no longer be answered by pointing at healthcare workers alone but needs to include many actors and levels of organization. We study the new roles, position and identities of practitioners, patients and regulators, and how they interact and steer healthcare.
The basis of our work is a reflective engagement with healthcare (regulatory) practices. Through projects as well as strategic partnerships we engage with practitioners and regulators to understand governance ‘from within’. We are specialized in ethnographic and discursive research methods. Studying ‘who cares’ needs a detailed focus on both healthcare and regulatory practices. Our leading researchers all have extensive networks in healthcare practice and in academia, both nationally and internationally. Strategic partnerships with central actors in healthcare give us a strong footing in Dutch healthcare practice. Our affiliation with the research schools Science, Technology and Modern Culture, and the Netherlands Institute of Governance, and collaborations with academic departments in the Netherlands and internationally, make for a strong academic context.