Tackling social inequalities in health: Assessing contexts for implementing integrated health access for people with severe mental illness

Abstract

Social inequalities in health are a complex problem that often emerge at the interfaces between different sectors, such as health and social care, and the corresponding transitions between different provider organisations. Vulnerable people are typically in greater need of accessing different sectors of the health system and therefore often experience lack of coherence in their treatment pathway. We aimed to examine the contexts of health systems that influence initiatives concerned with integrated health access. We used the theory of Organizational Fields to study the contexts for implementing Flexible Assertive Community Treatment (FACT) in Central Denmark Region and three municipalities in the region. We collected 33 documents and conducted six qualitative interviews with professionals involved in FACT to understand the contexts of implementing integrated health access. We found that contexts for implementing FACT are highly complex, as they are divided between health and social care (horizontal complexity) and between national and the sub-national levels of the region and the municipalities (vertical complexity). This leads to conflicting demands on implementation. Local contexts of collaboration may offer a lever to handle these demands, but these are likely to vary. Analysis of how complex health system contexts influence implementation is important to understand how changes might become sustainable and help to tackle social inequalities in health.