A Finnish City Cures Health-Care Inflation

摘要

Located just 100 miles below the Arctic Circle, Oulu, Finland, was for years famous for only one thing: the Air Guitar World Championships each August. Now the city of 196,000 has a new distinction: It boasts one of the world's most advanced e-health programs. A digital platform introduced in 2008 lets patients make appointments, refill prescriptions, and exchange messages with doctors from their home computers. There's even a device that diagnoses ear infections by measuring vibration of the tympanic membrane. Some 70,000 residents are already on the system, called Self Care. Most medical care in the country is provided by local governments, and Oulu introduced its e-health platform to control per capita health spending that ranked among Finland's highest. A diet rich in salt and fat-all that pan-fried muikku fish-resulted in elevated rates of hypertension and heart disease. "If we had done nothing, our costs would have doubled within a decade," says Kirsti Ylitalo-Katajisto, Oulu's health and welfare director. Before Self Care was introduced, Oulu's health budget was growing more than 7 percent annually. The rate is forecast to fall to zero in 2015.