National services in the specialist health care services

The term national services in the specialist health care services is a common term for national / bi-regional treatment services and national competence services. National services consist of highly specialized treatment and/or competence that should be centralized to one or two institutions in the country in order to be able to provide high quality services and competence.

A new governance system was introduced in 2011 in order to establish a more holistic and dynamic management and strengthened governance of national services. High quality will be ensured by requiring target measures and performance reporting for both the establishment of new national services and the operation of existing national services. Equal access to national services will be ensured by amongst other initiatives requiring the establishment of reference groups with representatives from all regional health authorities and user representation. National services are regulated by

Regulation for approval of hospitals, use of the term university hospital, and national services within the specialist health service