The role of knowledge management in healthcare is widely debated. According to the Swedish Municipalities and Regions (SKR), the purpose of knowledge management is to create “high quality care based on knowledge, equity and resource efficiency” [1]. Good idea, but care programs and cohesive person-centered care processes do not make a difference in and of themselves. Exactly as stated by the Care and Care Analysis Authority [2] A number of prerequisites, which are often missing today, must be in place to fulfill SKR’s hopes.

  • First, the physician should have space to research, read, and reflect on the content of care programs during their working hours.
  • Second, the local health care organization must have the skills and strength to implement care programs.
  • Third, all clinics covered by the care programs must have the resources to provide screening and additional treatment within the time frames stipulated by the care program.

According to SKR, the 26 national program areas have nearly 120 cognitive supports (of which 68 are primary care recommendations) in the pipeline for next year. [3]. In addition, primary care must also handle the 35 coherent person-centered care processes that include 29 different health conditions in addition to the cognitive support already completed. It is clear that very significant resources are required to put these guidelines into practice – resources drawn in many cases from actual patient work.

As far as I know, the effects of knowledge management have not been studied. Whether the thousands of pages of guidelines that will be applied in everyday work lead to better and more equal patient care – as SKR hopes – is not entirely clear. From a general medical perspective, the usefulness of separate care programs for individual diagnosis can also be called into question, as the majority of patients in greatest need of care are often affected by multiple care programs and coherent person-centered care processes. There are no guidelines on how to create a common patient unit.

With such ambiguity, it is very surprising that SKR has chosen to provide care programs and care operations on a broad front immediately. The structured presentation in selected areas, with identical control areas, has created excellent opportunities to increase knowledge about knowledge management.

The number of research questions that need to be answered to legitimize knowledge management is large:

  • How are the guidelines implemented most effectively?
  • What are the health economic effects of knowledge management?
  • How is medical quality affected by care programs and coherent person-centered care processes?
  • How is the work environment of healthcare staff affected by the constant flow of new recommendations and proposed approaches?

Everything we do in healthcare has an opportunity cost – the resources could have been used for something else. Therefore, it is now necessary to study the ability of knowledge management to create “knowledge-based, equal, high-quality and resource-efficient care” in accordance with scientific principles.