Buurtzorg – A pioneering healthcare organisation

Buurtzorg Nederland was founded in 2006 by Jos de Blok and a small team of professional nurses who realised that modernisation of care systems had undermined their relationships with patients. They set up Buurtzorg to look after people at home.
The Buurtzorg model starts from the client perspective and works outwards to assemble solutions that bring independence and improved quality of life. The principle underpinning the model is that the nurse acts as a “health coach” for the individual and their family, emphasising preventive health measures but also delivering necessary care themselves or calling on others to do so. The rule is that nurses must spend 61% of their time in direct contact with the people they support.
In this way the professional seeks to build a solution involving the client and their formal and informal networks. Self-management, continuity, building trusting relationships, and networks in the neighbourhood are all important and logical principles for the teams.
Buurtzorg relies on the principle of self-managing teams which have professional freedom with responsibility. A team of 12 work in a neighbourhood, taking care of people needing support as well managing the team’s work. A new team will find its own office in the neighbourhood, spend time introducing themselves to the local community and getting to know GPs and other professionals. The team decide how they organise the work, share responsibilities and make decisions.