The Association of Coordinated Care Employers (Związek Pracodawców Opieki Koordynowanej, ZPOK) is the first employers’ organisation in Poland to cover the entire care chain — from primary care, through outpatient specialist care, hospital treatment and rehabilitation, to long-term care, home care, social assistance and personal assistance. The Association is currently being established; the Healthcare Poland Foundation is a co-founder alongside the Polish Hospital Federation, the National Chamber of Long-Term Care Homes and the Polish Home Care Association.

The problem the Association addresses

Coordinated care in Poland operates mainly at a single level — primary care, under the model rolled out from October 2022, which covered some 32–33% of primary care providers in its first eighteen months. Above that level the care chain breaks: no employers’ organisation represents it as a whole.

Institutional fragmentation means, in practice, loss of informational continuity where primary care, outpatient specialist care, hospitals and the home environment meet; duplicated diagnostics; the absence of shared value measures covering the full episode of care and the patient’s return to functioning; inefficient allocation of staff and infrastructure; and the separation of medical care from the citizen’s living environment — social assistance, home support and personal assistance. The systemic consequence is dispersed responsibility: the burden of holding care together falls on the patient and the family.

Objectives of the Association

1. Representing and protecting the interests of employers operating in coordinated care at every level of the chain — primary care, outpatient specialist care, hospitals, rehabilitation, long-term care, home care, social assistance and personal assistance.
2. Participation in social dialogue with public authorities — in particular the Ministry of Health, the National Health Fund, the Agency for Health Technology Assessment and Tariff System, and the Ministry of Family, Labour and Social Policy.
3. Protection of the citizen’s rights as the beneficiary of integrated care: the right to continuity of care, to information about one’s own health, and to support in one’s living environment — in cooperation with the Commissioner for Human Rights and the Patient Ombudsman.
4. Promotion of Value Based Healthcare and of payment systems rewarding health and social outcomes, both medical and non-medical.
5. Support for standardisation and quality certification of coordinated care — including beyond the walls of medical facilities, in social and community services.
6. Digital integration of coordinated care providers: interoperability of information systems under EHDS and HL7 FHIR, extending to social assistance systems.
7. Development of community care, telemedicine, home support and personal assistance as integral links in the care chain rather than peripheral services.
8. Integration of the health and social assistance sectors around a single, coherent approach to the citizen.
9. International cooperation in benchmarking, knowledge transfer and the exchange of organisational models.
10. Representation of the Polish coordinated care sector internationally — in European Union institutions and sector organisations.
11. Participation in cross-border pilot projects, including under the Cross-Border Healthcare Directive, EHDS and EU4Health programmes.
12. Building partnerships with coordinated care systems in the EU, EFTA, the United Kingdom, Israel and the United States.

How the Association pursues these objectives

• Providing opinions on legislation concerning the organisation of healthcare, social assistance and civic rights.
• Dialogue with public payers on contracting models and tariffs that account for the full value chain, including community care and assistance.
• Advocating bundled payments for the entire episode of care and shared quality indicators across primary, outpatient and hospital care.
• Quality standardisation and certification with the Healthcare Poland Foundation (the TQAMS standard) and quality audits.
• Establishing pilot consortia combining medical care, community care and social assistance.
• Maintaining benchmarking databases and analyses of health and social value, including non-medical outcomes.
• Cooperation with social assistance centres on integrated coordination of support for the citizen.
• Organising conferences, training and exchange programmes bridging the health and social policy sectors.
• Participation in international project consortia and European Union grant programmes.
• Promoting Polish coordinated care models and certification standards abroad.

Why an employers’ association rather than a foundation

The legal form is not a technicality — it determines whether an organisation has standing in social dialogue or remains an advisory voice.

Legal basis

The Association is being established as an employers’ organisation under the Act of 23 May 1991 on Employers’ Organisations (consolidated text: Journal of Laws 2025, item 423). The Act sets the framework for the founding process:

• Article 1(1) — employers may form organisations at their own discretion, without prior authorisation.
• Article 7(1) — at least ten employers are required to establish an organisation.
• Article 7(3) — the founding assembly adopts the statute and elects a founding committee of at least three members.
• Article 8 — sets out the mandatory content of the statute: name and scope of activity, governing bodies and how they are elected, objectives and means of pursuing them, membership rules, members’ rights and duties, representation, amendment procedure and sources of funding.
• Article 9 — the founding committee files for registration in the National Court Register within 30 days of establishment.
• Article 10 — legal personality is acquired upon registration.
• Article 18(1) — income from economic activity serves statutory purposes and may not be distributed among members.

Who can join

Governing bodies

The model separates supervision from management: the Supreme Council exercises strategic and ex-post control, day-to-day operational management rests solely with the Director General, and the decision to remove the Director General belongs to the membership as a whole rather than to a narrow group.

Founders and current status

The initiative is led jointly by the Polish Hospital Federation, the Healthcare Poland Foundation, the National Chamber of Long-Term Care Homes and the Polish Home Care Association. The founding entities include public and private hospitals, primary and outpatient specialist care providers, long-term, nursing and home care centres, and social sector organisations. The full list of founding members will be published after the founding assembly.

• April 2026Founding document drafted — diagnosis of the systemic gap, the concept of the Association, analysis of the legal basis and a stakeholder map.
• 6 May 2026The process formally initiated at SeniorCare Expo Poland in Nadarzyn — a meeting of the initiators and the first declarations from founding entities.
• June 2026Draft statute, and circulation to prospective founding members of the description of the Association’s field and scope of activity for consultation.
• August 2026Second version of the statute following comments, and an approach to the Coordinated Care Department of the Ministry of Health proposing a working meeting.
• September 2026Establishment of the Association during the 11th Healthcare Manager Academy in Warsaw (24–25 September) and talks at the Ministry of Health on the place of coordinated care in dialogue with the payer.
• Next stepsFiling for registration in the National Court Register, constituting the governing bodies, and the Association’s first position on financing the full episode of care.

International dimension

The statute provides for activity outside Poland in pursuit of the Association’s objectives. This includes membership of national and international sector federations, agreements with foreign employers’ organisations and healthcare providers, participation in international project consortia, and delegating representatives to working groups of European institutions and international organisations. The reference point is the work of the Global Healthcare Systems Hub, whose benchmarking covers health systems in 56 countries.

Anchored in the Healthcare Poland ecosystem

How to join

Hospitals, primary and outpatient specialist care providers, rehabilitation, long-term, nursing and home care centres, social assistance and community support units, and technology partners are invited to take part in the Association’s work. Please include a short note on your organisation’s profile, the level of the care chain at which it operates, and its experience in coordination.