The purpose of this thesis is to explore the institutionally shaped response to the introduction of the national guidelines on the Swedish regional health policy arena. The thesis consists of two case studies. Adapting a qualitative approach, the data is based on individual interviews and these were analysed thematically. The first paper explores the response by four Swedish regional health authorities to the introduction of the National Guidelines for Cardiac Care, while the second paper aims to broaden the understanding of how the national guidelines are used for strategic purposes among politicians.

As illustrated in this thesis, organizations will respond, adjust and react to external pressure according to conditions shaped by the institutional context. Key findings here are that the national guidelines are a complex policy instrument that, beyond being able to be used in an instrumental fashion by the medical managment, can also serve a legitimizing function for political decision-makers.

The goals of the national guidelines, i.e. equal and efficient care, and the uncertainty about who, among multiple stakeholders, is responsible for the guidelines in the regional health authority, is a source of ambiguity and potential conflict. Those who are potentially responsible represent different rationales – a political rationale and a scientific rationale. The dominating scientific rationale of the national guidelines can create instability, when pushing towards the use of explicit priority-setting.

Priority-setting in the institutional setting of a regional health authority has strong elements of becoming “wicked problems” since the dilemma of prioritization remains regardless of ambitions to apply a “technocratic fix”. A wicked problem is characterized by high complexity and being persistently hard to solve (Williams et al. 2012). A recurring dilemma is that priority-setting still contains many wicked problems, as social values and political considerations remain important parts of the policy process. One weakness of the national guidelines, identified in this thesis, is that the guidelines discuss each service area separately, and thereby reinforce a silo mentality in the Swedish health policy arena.

To sum up, the national guidelines create a multifaceted and complex response in the Swedish health policy arena where different rationalities collide, and where conflicts appear and are dealt with within the regional health authorities.