Factors that Influence and Shape the Setting of Health Care Priorities - Essay Example

Factors that Influence and Shape the Setting of Health Care Priorities Factors that Influence and Shape the Setting of Health Care Priorities Introduction The importance of the health care system in the nation or region cannot be overemphasised. In this regard, every nation identifies the importance of the health care system in implementing its development agenda since it needs a healthy population in order to grow and power the economy to prosperity. By health care, this essay focuses on the public health system, promotion of health, and health care services that focus on the diagnosis of patients and the treatment of these patients in a health care facility setting (Hardcastle et al., 2011). In this case, we cannot delink and conceptualise public health and health care separately since both focus on the improvement of the health of the entire population, in a country or a region, although health care focuses on individual care while public health care focuses on a part of the population, or the entire population (Gostin et al., 2011). However, the type of the health care that the nation provides is determined by the quality of care offered and the outcome of care provided by practitioners in the health care sector. In this case, the quality of care is the most important aspect as it determines the health of the entire population. Various research studies identify the importance of the quality of care in determining the outcome of care with the outcome of care provided being the most important aspect in the determination of the effectiveness of a nation’s health care system (Hermann et al., 2006; Parish et al., 2011; Pincus et al., 2007; Shih et al., 2013). To achieve effectiveness in the health care sector with the aim of achieving quality care, it is important to ensure that there is sufficient allocation of resources that are consequently utilised in an approach that was effective. In this case, allocation of resources should not only be done without following their implementation and utilisation in every level and organisation of the health care system in which the resources are required. This implies that the efficiency of the health care sector is determined by various factors with the amount of resources allocated determining the implementation of services in ensuring that the health care sector met the needs of the nation. In line with this, Kluge (2007) identified resources as critical in setting the priority in the health care sector. Stakeholders face a challenge related to the setting of priorities in an environment whereby the resources allocated are not sufficient to implement a health care system that addresses the needs of all stakeholders in the nation’s health care system. This is a fact that the National Health Service’s Commission Board (2013) identified and highlighted the importance of ensuring there was an ethical framework that focuses on setting the priority for the UK’s health care system and allocating resources to various sections of the health care system with a view of maximising the quality of care provided by the country. Based on the foregoing, this paper identifies the difficult managerial decisions faced by the NHS in dealing with the issues related to the scarcity of resources required in the health care sector and the growing demand of health care that strains the existing facilities and infrastructure in the wake of the scarce resources. In line with this, the expose engages in a critical analysis of the factors that influence and shape the setting of health care priorities in an increasingly challenging economic climate. Hence, the first part of the paper will focus on the importance of implementing an effective health care system that meets the needs of the country and the people without focusing on the aspect of resources. In the second part, the paper will focus on the important role played by effective allocation of resources in the health care sector while identifying the resources that are required for an effective health care system. In line with this, the paper will focus on the influence of the factors that are considered when setting the priorities for the nation’s health care sector. Effective Health Care System As earlier mentioned, every nation identifies the important role played by effective health care system. In this case, an effective health care system is essential in meeting the development agenda and needs of the country (Paris, Devaux, & Wei, 2010). In an effective health care system, medical practitioners’ value the important role played by the outcome of care that medical practitioners provided their patients. In an effective health care system, the medical practitioners are properly trained under a curriculum that was well developed and based on the evidence that was available from practice (Haines & Metcalf, 2011). Evidence-based practice involves a multidisciplinary approach in which clinical practice involves the use of evidence gathered from research in order to make clinical decisions that had an impact on the outcome of care that providers gave their patients (Titler, 2008). In this case, evidence based practice ensures that nurses, clinicians, and other medical practitioners integrated evidence into their expertise in order to provide the best quality of care to their patients (Hjørland, 2011). Another crucial aspect of effective health care is the allocation of resources in order to achieve various objectives. These objectives include the effective training of medical practitioners and the allocation of resources to acquire equipment and infrastructure that focus on improving the health care system (Wolper, 2010). This allocation of resources towards conducting research is also crucial in ensuring that there was sufficient evidence from research that provided nurses, clinicians, and other medical practitioners with sufficient resources to use when making clinical decisions. Importantly, these resources are essential in ensuring that the quality of care provided by a health care system is high in quality and responds to the needs of the nation. Moreover, effective health care system ensured that the patient was an active participant in their care with the objective of providing care that was patient-centred. Patient-centred care is essential in improving the quality of care and outcomes of care as it promotes the satisfaction of care among patients, which is an effective step towards an effective health care system (Reynolds, 2009; Zaretzky, 2013). Since effective care could only be achieved by allocation of sufficient resources to all aspects that influence the quality of care provided, the ideal world in which there are sufficient resources allocated in all aspects of care is not possible in the current setting. Therefore, the failure to achieve the ideal situation calls for priority setting with a view of ensuring that the most important areas that need resources and were the most important were first addressed before moving onto other aspects. Otherwise, were resources to be adequate to address all aspects of the health care sector, not only then could care be affordable but it could be quality care that was effective and responded to the needs of the country. Consequently, the country could be in a vantage position of implementing its development agenda based on a healthy population that had access to quality and affordable care. Resource Required in Health Care One of the most important aspects of the resources required in the healthcare sector is the human resource capital that is essential in ensuring that there is effective health care provision in the sector. Like in any other sector, it is evident that the human resources capital is the most crucial resource required in accomplishing the objectives of the health care sector. For example, nurses play an important role in providing care and treatment to patients. In this case, nurses could act as managers in the health care sector since they play various roles of taking care and treating patients (McSherry et al., 2011). In particular, nurse leaders and managers play an important role in ensuring that other nurses provided care that was high in quality while practicing compassion with their patients and being innovative in providing care and treatment that was effective in achieving positive outcomes (McSherry & Douglas, 2011; Douglas, 2011). This is the same for other professions working in the health care sector such as clinicians and other medical practitioners. In this case, they should work with a view of ensuring that there was effective provision of high-quality care and treatment. Other important resources in the health care sector include financial resources that determine the quality of care provided. Financial resources are essential in every aspect of care since they determine the quantity of health care workers and practitioners to be hired and the infrastructure required for a successful health care system. This infrastructure includes health care facilities and training facilities such as medical and nursing schools that are crucial for providing quality and well-trained work force that provided care to the entire nation. In line with this, the ratio for medical practitioners to patients should ensure that it was adequately proportion in order to fulfil the needs of the nation and provide care to all people. On the other hand, financial resources ensure that health care facilities are constructed in a manner that ensured equality among the entire population based on their distribution across the country. As earlier indicated, the importance of research in the health care sector cannot be overemphasised. In this regard, medical practitioners need research and evidence from research in order to make their decisions based on the evidence presented from their practice and provide quality care to their patients based also on their expertise. It is common knowledge that the process of research requires extensive investment of resources in order to provide findings that contributed to the aspect of evidence based practice. Therefore, investing financial resources in the aspect of research in the health care sector ensures that the process of care was effective with the outcome being the provision of quality care to patients. Priority Setting in the Health Care Sector Sibbald et al. (2009) identifies the process of priority setting as making a choice based on a ranking system although this term could be associated closely with the aspect of resource allocation, in the health care sector, especially in the prevailing economic situation whereby most countries all over the world are dealing with the effects of the recent economic crisis. In all parts of the country’s health care system, there is an aspect of prioritising since the demands for providing effective health care system are more than the resources required to meet these demands (Peacock et al., 2006). In instances whereby the government is in charge of the public health care sector as it is the case with many countries of the world, the demands far exceed the level and amount of resources available with the decisions of prioritising being made in different level of the health care sector. While identifying the importance of priority setting, Arvidsson et al. (2010) noted priority setting is significant since it has varying implications on the health care costs and the outcomes of care provided by the system as a whole. Baerøe (2008) identifies priority setting as occurring in all levels of the organisation in which there are various decisions being made with a focus on the budgets of the health care, the kind of services that require prioritising, the kind of services to acquire, and the services that individual patients should receive as offered by a health care system. In this regard, decision-making occurs at a micro- and macro-level of decision-making in order to consider the areas that require prioritising and the importance of prioritising these areas. Nonetheless, these levels have a relationship that ensures that there is interplay between these two and they effectively influence the health care sector. Baerøe (2008) identifies macro-level decisions as those based on the allocation of revenue to the health care sector. In this case, it is evident that revenue plays an important role in the health care sector as it determines various factors and influences the process of priority setting in the health care sector. In this case, revenue allocation has an effect on the health care needs of the country’s population based on a comprehensive level. The type of decisions to considers, under this level, focuses on the kind of health care services that the nation should provide and the capacity of each service that the health care system should provide to its users. In addition, macro-level decisions and considerations also focus on the clinical guidelines development with a view of the characteristics of health care that patients should get in a health care facility. On the other hand, micro-level decisions are the decisions that clinicians and medical care practitioners develop on a medical level (Baerøe, 2008). This supports the hypothesis that priority setting occurs in all levels of the organisation of the health care sector and not only in the national level. Instead, clinicians and medical practitioners set priorities based on their resource allocations and other factors. Case in point, clinicians could set priorities based on patients who qualify for specific drugs that could be expensive with regard to their costs and the duration of time within which a patient could remain admitted in a health care sector. In this regard, their priority setting focuses on creating space for another care user based on the limited resources within the health care facility. On the other hand, clinicians set priorities as influenced by factors related to the wellness of their patients and the need of the patient to obtain further investigation. In this case, factors associated with the needs of the patient influence priority setting by clinicians in the process of providing care to their patients. While focusing on the aspect of priority setting when looking at it on a broad sense, the aspect has a direct connection to the choice between making available or holding back (limiting) some form of potential benefit of health care service. The process occurs in a manner that could be clear, inherent, or even hidden in an intentional manner. In the contemporary health care sector, the public has played an important role in shaping the health care sector by participating in various approaches. Consequently, one of the factors that have played an important role in influencing priority setting is the role played by the public by participating in the public health care system (Bruni, Laupacis, & Martin, 2008; Mitton et al., 2009). In particular, the UK public plays an essential role in the health care system and especially in establishing priorities for the country’s health care system. The desire to have the public involved in priority setting has been driven by the government’s need to involve people in determining the care they received and by the consumer movements that guide consumer involvement in the process of their care (McDonald & Ollerenshaw, 2011). These consumer movements are an important factor that influences the setting of priorities in the health care sector through ensuring that patients, clients, and the entire community had a strong voice that required inclusion in the decision-making process. However, despite there being a general agreement on the need to involve the consumers with their care, there is debate on the various approaches in which they could be involved with their input being put under focus especially with regard to priority setting (Wiseman et al., 2009). In the face of this debate, the role played by public participation in the health care sector whether as individual patients during their participation, in their care, and as a community, in identifying improvements on their care, influences the aspect of priority setting within the health care sector. In fact, the weight that the public has determined the resources allocated in order to implement various projects geared towards improving the health care process of the community under focus. With regard to prioritising within the clinical setting, Skirbekk and Nortvedt (2011) identified the need of clinicians in ‘making a difference for the patient’ as a factor that influenced priority setting in the health care sector. In line with this, the research study conducted by these two authors that focused on the practices of health care professionals’ practices when dealing with the concern between care and their concern for particular patients found that the priority setting by clinicians was carried out with a view to providing quality care for patients. In line with this, it is essential to point out that the quality of care provided by the clinicians influenced the setting of priorities within the health care sector as evidenced by the clinicians’ needs to make sure that they made a difference in the wellbeing of their patients. Conclusion Based on the foregoing, it is evident that priority setting in the health care sector is a phenomenon that is practised globally. In an environment whereby the economic situation whereby the recent economic crisis produced adverse effects that affected all sectors including the health care sector, it is essential to set priorities on the most important aspects of care that require urgent attention (Notara et al., 2013). In effect, the economic situation, in the UK and all over the world, is an important factor that has influenced the setting of priorities in the health care sector since the resources are insufficient to the extent that they cannot address the needs of the entire population. Hence, all levels of the health care organisation system play a role in setting priorities based on the projects to implement based on the available financial resources. On the other hand, priority setting also occurs in the clinical setting. This is influenced by two factors. First, it is evident that patients are increasingly being involved in the process of their care and treatment with this factor influencing the setting of priority by clinicians. Secondly, clinicians set priorities on the care of their patients as influenced by the need to make the wellbeing of their patients better. In this case, they set priorities on the procedures required by a patient and other important aspects related to care. Finally, it is evident that the current health care sector operates in an environment whereby the public is actively participating in the health care system. Consequently, this factor has influenced the setting of priorities since the communities identify the most important aspects that they need to focus on in order to ensure that they received quality care. Beyond all this, it should not be forgotten that the setting of priorities, in the health care sector, focuses on providing quality care to users. 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