About Region Zealand

Region Zealand - What is a Region?

In Denmark, Region has two definitions; it can either refer to a geographical region of Denmark or the political organisation that governs it. Regions were created in 2007 and replaced smaller political organisations referred to as “Amter” of which there were 14.

The purpose of the regions was to centralise governance of, especially, the healthcare system, but also other areas such as environment and infrastructure.

To better understand what a region is, we need to put it into the broader perspective of the Danish political administrative system.

1. At the top, you have the government and state level administrative functions. These governmental bodies, as in most places, set the overall political and developmental direction for the country as a whole.
2. The second level of administration are the Regions, which consist of 5 different regional political bodies: Region Capital, Region Zealand, Region Southern Denmark, Region Mid Jutland and Region North Jutland. The primary directive of the regions is to govern the country’s hospital, psychiatric and social services, but other areas such as traffic and environmental pollution are also key areas of the regions.
3. Thirdly is the municipality level, these are local governing bodies. Municipalities also carry a lot of the practical burden of the Danish healthcare system, mainly elder care. They also handle unemployment support and a long list of other areas. There are 98 municipalities in Denmark.

As such, regions carry a lot of weight, but mostly in specialised areas. It is very far from being a state, similar to the US, as it carries no power to create legislation, but is instead more akin to a, politically run, umbrella corporation with multiple smaller organisations (hospitals etc.) within it.

The region controls the overall budget, which is awarded primarily from the government, and splits it out amongst the hospitals and other institutions. It also funds developmental projects, including international recruitment.

To keep the designation of a political organisation, the region is governed by a regional council, consisting of 41 regional politicians, which are elected every four years.

Below the regional council lies an administrative regional organisation, whose main function is to both serve the political council, but also provide, assistance to the hospitals and other institutions. This includes areas such as HR, finance, salary, negotiations, procurement and many more. But it also includes areas such as “Det Nære Sundhedsvæsen” (The Near Healtchare Service), which provide health options and cooperation opportunities between the Hospitals, general practitioners and the citizens.

All in all, the Regions are an important part of the Danish healthcare system, and as you can read below, quite a large organisation as well.

Below you can learn a bit more information about Region Zealand.

Region Zealand - The Organisation

As mentioned above, Region Zealand is one of the five regions governing an area of Denmark. As you can see on the image above, the region covers the majority of the Zealand region south and west of the capital region. This means that that region encompasses:

• 850.000+ residents
• Covering a 7.274 km2 area and
• 17 municipalities.

The region has a yearly budget of between 23-25 billion DKK and is cloing in at 20.000 employees.

This is to ensure the operations of three somatic hospitals in six locations, one psychiatric hospital in three locations and 13 social institutions spread across the region. There is also a central administrative building located in Sorø, which houses the political and inter-organisational administrative services, such as the regions executive board, legal and salary teams and many other functions, including international recruitment.

The somatic hospitals have their own local leadership structure, and some have fused to create better a more connected operation. As such, the hospitals are constructed as follows:

• Zealand University Hospital – Located in the cities of Roskilde, Køge and Nykøbing F.
• Holbæk Hospital – Located in the city of Holbæk
• NSR Hospital – Located in cities of Næstved, Slagelse and Ringsted.

These structures indicate which leadership structure the departments refers back to, but is not always indicative of where the department is located. As an example, The Department of Pathology is located in, and refers back to, Zealand University Hospital, Roskilde, but the department also has laboratories in Næstved, which is part of NSR. The hospitals are very interconnected, which reflects how the Danish healthcare system functions in general.

The psychiatric hospitals are more of a collective organisation, with somewhat independent local branches. The psychiatric hospitals have one overarching leadership branch that governs the entire area, but also have local branch leadership. The psychiatric hospitals are located in:

• Psychiatric West – Slagelse
• Psychiatric East – Roskilde
• Psychiatric South – Vordingborg

Alongside the primary institutions, there are multiple psychiatric clinics as well.

For more information about the individual hospitals, please visit the section on hospitals.