Classification of Health Care Providers (ICHA-HP)

Health care providers encompass organisations and actors that deliver health care goods and services as their primary activity, as well as those for which health care provision is only one among a number of activities. They vary in their legal, accounting, organisational and operating structures. However, despite the huge differences that exist in the way health care provision is organised, there is a set of common approaches and technologies that all health care systems share and that helps to structure them. The classification of health care providers (ICHA-HP) therefore serves the purpose of classifying all organisations that contribute to the provision of health care goods and services, by arranging country-specific provider units into common, internationally applicable categories.