Barriers to collaboration between health care, social services and schools

Background: It is essential for professionals from different organizations to collaborate when handling matters concerning children, adolescents, and their families in order to enable society to provide holistic health care and social services.

Objective: This paper reports perceptions of obstacles to collaboration among professionals in health care (county council), social services (municipality), and schools in an administrative district of the city of Stockholm, Sweden.

Methods: Data were collected in focus group interviews with unit managers and employees.

Results and discussion: Our results show that the responsibility for collaboration fell largely on the professionals. Also, there was a lack of clarity regarding differences in mission and regulations, allocation of responsibilities, competence, explanatory models, and working approach. We conclude that a holding environment and a committed management would support these professionals in their efforts to collaborate.