Residents of Drenthe villages and neighborhoods must be given an important voice in determining future healthcare policy in the province. This is the opinion of representatives of residents’ initiatives in the field of care and welfare. According to them, villagers and neighbors will become indispensable for maintaining the quality of care in Drenthe.
Various Drenthe resident initiatives are joining forces to gain more influence on the way care is provided in the province. The residents want them to become an important part of the healthcare provision of the future.
At the moment, there is not enough attention for how volunteers can relieve the burden on professional caregivers, says Roelof Dilling of Grolloo Zorgt. This residents’ initiative is one of the five participants in the Drents Collective Residents’ Initiatives for Care and Welfare.
Volunteers are now already being deployed by residents’ initiatives in Hollandscheveld or Grolloo, for example, to support informal caregivers or to make car journeys that would normally require taxi transport. But you can also hang up a lamp or dig up the garden.
“We are increasingly confronted with an aging population in Drenthe and you see that professional organizations are already short of resources,” says Dilling. According to him, volunteers from their own environment could partly prevent people from calling on healthcare providers.
“If you, as an older person, spend a lot of time alone at home and everyday things such as shopping or doing chores around the house become difficult, it can become quite stressful. I think that by paying attention to each other and involving them in activities, you can help people to to achieve a healthier lifestyle. This can prevent professional care.”
The initiators behind the new healthcare collective hope that the role of compassion will be structurally included in determining healthcare policy in Drenthe. In any case, they can join the provincial Health Table, where Drenthe healthcare and welfare organizations discuss the future of healthcare.
Dilling: “If we can make a full contribution at the front, we can achieve a lot. Together with professionals, we want to ensure that the quality of healthcare in twenty or thirty years will still be as good as it is today.”
Watch the video to see how volunteers from the residents’ initiative Hollandscheveld Verbindt help the elderly to relieve the burden on care
