Parkinson Network Eastern Saxony (PANOS): Reaching Consensus for a Regional Intersectoral Integrated Care Concept for Patients with Parkinson’s Disease in the Region of Eastern Saxony, Germany

• Main Authors: Kai F. Loewenbrück, Doron B. Stein, Volker E. Amelung, Robert Bitterlich, Martin Brumme, Björn Falkenburger, Annekathrin Fehre, Tim Feige, Anika Frank, Carola Gißke, Claudia Helmert, Linda Kerkemeyer, Andreas Knapp, Caroline Lang, Annegret Leuner, Carina Lummer, Mirella M.N. Minkman, Gabriele Müller, Marlena van Munster, Hannes Schlieter, Peter Themann, Nick Zonneveld, Martin Wolz
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: MDPI AG 2020-09-01
• Series: Journal of Clinical Medicine
• Subjects: Parkinson disease; consensus; clinical pathway; integrated delivery of health care; patient care team; community networks
• Online Access: https://www.mdpi.com/2077-0383/9/9/2906

As integrated care is recognized as crucial to meet the challenges of chronic conditions such as Parkinson’s disease (PD), integrated care networks have emerged internationally and throughout Germany. One of these networks is the Parkinson Network Eastern Saxony (PANOS). PANOS aims to deliver timely and equal care to PD patients with a collaborative intersectoral structured care pathway. Additional components encompass personalized case management, an electronic health record, and communicative and educative measures. To reach an intersectoral consensus of the future collaboration in PANOS, a structured consensus process was conducted in three sequential workshops. Community-based physicians, PD specialists, therapists, scientists and representatives of regulatory authorities and statutory health insurances were asked to rate core pathway-elements and supporting technological, personal and communicative measures. For the majority of core elements/planned measures, a consensus was reached, defined as an agreement by >75% of participants. Additionally, six representatives from all partners involved in the network-design independently assessed PANOS based on the Development Model for Integrated Care (DMIC), a validated model addressing the comprehensiveness and maturity of integrated care concepts. The results show that PANOS is currently in an early maturation state but has the potential to comprehensively represent the DMIC if all planned activities are implemented successfully. Despite the favorable high level of consensus regarding the PANOS concept and despite its potential to become a balanced integrated care concept according to the DMIC, its full implementation remains a considerable challenge.