The Omaha System in the Netherlands
Buurtzorg helped bring this nursing classification system to the Netherlands, where most community nursing now works with it.
A shared language for nurses, with the focus on interventions and outcomes.
The Omaha System is a standardised classification for nursing care, developed at the Visiting Nurse Association of Omaha in the United States between 1975 and 1993. It has three parts: a classification of client problems, a scheme of interventions and a scale for rating outcomes. Together they give nurses a shared language to plan, record and evaluate care, with the focus on interventions and outcomes.
Buurtzorg helped bring the Omaha System to the Netherlands. Together with its IT partner Ecare, Buurtzorg built the system into Buurtzorg Web and tested and refined it over several years. By 2010 Buurtzorg was in talks with health insurers and the Ministry of Health about making it a national standard.
Since then the system has spread well beyond Buurtzorg. In 2014 the Ministry of Health supported the foundation Omaha System Support with a subsidy, and by 2022 around 80% of community nursing in the Netherlands was working with the Omaha System.
Sources
- Vilans, Zoeken naar de gouden standaard, 2014 (in Dutch)
- Jos de Blok, Buurtzorg Nederland: A New Perspective on Elder Care in the Netherlands, AARP The Journal, 2011
- ICT&health, Data Omaha System onmisbaar voor toekomstige zorg, 2022 (in Dutch)
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