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B'Yachad, we'll fix our healthcare system

B’Yachad’s plan to fix our healthcare system is designed to shorten wait times for treatment and bring quality medicine closer to home. One in three Israelis today forgoes medical treatment because of wait times – almost three times as many as a decade ago – and a resident of the north travels an average of almost 20 kilometers to the nearest hospital, compared to 3 to 4 kilometers in Tel Aviv. Our plan will establish dozens of community health centers nationwide within five years that will transfer minor surgeries, imaging tests, and specialist clinics from hospitals to the community, bring home from amongst the 3,700 Israeli doctors currently working abroad, and double investment in preventive medicine.

What's the problem?

One in three Israelis forgoes medical care because of waiting times – a nearly threefold increase in the past decade. This reality is not fate, but the result of a system at risk of failure and that has become accustomed to concentrating almost everything in hospitals: wards are overcrowded and the queue for an examination, consultation or minor surgery is getting longer.

Israel still leads the world in health indicators, but the infrastructure underneath is eroding: the number of hospital beds per capita is among the lowest in the developed world, wards operate at one of the highest occupancy rates in the OECD, and Israel trains fewer new doctors than any other developed country, while a quarter of doctors are already over retirement age.

This gap is particularly acute in the periphery, where there are fewer beds and fewer doctors per resident. A resident of the north travels an average of almost 20 kilometers to the nearest hospital, compared to 3 to 4 kilometers in Tel Aviv.
Good medical outcomes will not hold up on a thin infrastructure: without change, both the accessibility and quality of medicine will be impacted. Just as the number of people aged 65 and over is set to double by 2040.

What's the solution?

Israel has been blessed with brilliant minds and some of the most advanced medicine in the world. Our vision is to ensure that this excellence will not be accessible to only a few or those who live in the center of the country, but will be accessible, available and close to home for every citizen regardless of where they live. It is time to stop pouring money into the same structure and move to a long-term strategic plan that changes the rules of the game: where medicine is provided, who provides it and when it is provided so that accessibility and quality of care will increase.

Our plan translates that vision into practical steps on the ground in four ways: We will move a significant amount of minor treatments and surgeries, imaging tests and specialist clinics from hospitals to community health centers nationwide.

At the same time, we will bring our leading hospitals themselves to the north and south, so that the quality of care will be determined by medical need and not by distance from one’s home. We will return to planning for an adequate medical workforce years in advance instead of reacting after personnel shortages have already arisen, and we will bring Israeli doctors working abroad back home. We will invest in preventative medicine, because the cheapest and safest way to shorten the queue for care is for fewer people to need care. And we will harness Israel’s technological advantage – which today is almost entirely exported – so that it serves the Israeli patient first.

B'Yachad, we'll fix Israel's healthcare system

Community Healthcare Centers – Quality Care Closer to Home

To reduce the crippling burden on hospitals, improve the quality of care, and shorten waiting times for appointments, we will establish dozens of community medical centers nationwide within five years. These centers will provide services such as surgery under local anesthesia, advanced imaging, consulting clinics, and emergency medicine right near home, and their establishment will be prioritized in areas that currently suffer from the greatest gaps in the accessibility of medical care- especially the periphery.

Long-term planning for the medical workforce

We will establish a national body for strategic planning for the healthcare workforce across the entire system. This body which will regulate training and specialization, set standards according to the needs of the population, and direct staff to areas and regions where the shortage is acute.

We will improve doctor-to-patient ratios to the OECD average and close the gap in nursing where Israel is even further from the average. This way, our system will be prepared in advance for a growing and aging population instead of reacting after a staffing shortage has already occurred.

Bringing doctors home and preventing others from leaving

More than 3,700 Israeli doctors are currently working abroad with no government plan to bring them back. We will establish a “return desk” that does not wait to be contacted but rather goes out and brings them home. One that encourages doctors to return on a large scale and supports those who do throughout their journey. We will offer appropriate salary conditions, shorten licensing and regulatory procedures, and research and management tracks in Israel. Stopping this bleeding is an immediate action that will add physicians in the coming years while the medical education system is prepared for the long term.

Preventative Medicine: Not treating sickness, but preventing it

The best way to shorten wait times is simply to have fewer sick Israelis in the first place. We will double the investment in preventive medicine and reward HMOs not only for treating patients, but also for preventing sickness, early detection of disease and maintaining health over time.

We will take preventive medicine beyond the confines of the healthcare clinic and incorporate health considerations into the planning and budgeting of all government ministries: from education and transportation to housing, urban planning and welfare. We will start with prevention at an early age and in the education system, with nutrition and physical activity, dental health, vision and hearing, and the detection and treatment of health and developmental problems accessible even in daycare centers. We will encourage walking and physical activity in the planning of public spaces, lighted and shaded paths, and fitness facilities. Doctors will also be able to write a “social prescription” for walking groups, sports, social groups, and more as part of treatment plans. We will revolutionize preventive medicine because the best healthcare system is the one that prevents people from needing it, and every shekel invested in preventive medicine returns 14x.

We’ll bring our best hospitals to communities on the periphery

We will initiate and encourage the establishment of hospitals and hospital branches in the north and south which will be operated and managed by the leading medical centers in Israel. In this way, we will bring to the north and south the knowledge, expertise, management, and medical standards of the leading hospitals in Israel.

AI: the advantage that Israel has not yet leveraged

Israel has 25 years of digitized medical records – one of the best databases in the world. We will establish a national information platform, privacy-protected, according to the Singaporean model. There will be a unified and synchronized medical record for each patient that will allow for easy and efficient maintenance of the treatment process. We will incentivize health funds, hospitals and medical professionals to innovate, and we will establish a dedicated authority that will quickly audit the quality and safety of hi-tech medical tools before they reach the patient. In this way, Israel will stop exporting its technological advantage before Israeli patients benefit first.