Change in the Healthcare Environment - Assignment Example

? Questions and Answers Affiliation: To what extent have external forces like the Leapfrog Group influenced change in the healthcare environment? Has this been positive or negative? The healthcare sector has over the time undergone immense changes, characterized by improved healthcare systems that aid access and service delivery. These changes have been triggered by various sources, including but not limited to individuals, groups of people, government healthcare evaluators and the society at large. On a more specific ground, external forces have had their contribution to the changes observed in the healthcare environment. One of the identifiable external forces that have influenced change in the healthcare environment is the Leapfrog Group and related external factors. Changes in the healthcare sector have been tailored towards making healthcare accessible and affordable. On the same note, aspects of effective and efficient service delivery systems have been advocated for, formulated and implemented. This has led to the realization of healthcare services that by greater margin meet their primary purposes, among them promoting and upholding good health to the larger society. These external factors have been the driving force of change in the healthcare sector of the country. While the government has crucial concerns about healthcare issues, triggering change from within the system has been observed to be slow and inefficient over time. With the presence of Leapfrog Group among other external forces in the healthcare environment, quick, efficient and effective changes in healthcare have been realized. Specifically, evidence-based initiatives have been successfully introduced. On the same note, modern technology-based physician order entries, hospital referrals and ICU staffing has been enhanced and improved through external forces advocacy (Stead &Herbert, 2009). Your sister is entering into the hospital for elective surgery. She asks you how to determine she is safe while in the hospital. What do you tell her and why. Patient’s safety in any hospital is setting is fundamentally defined by patient rights. A patient that knows his or her rights is bound to feel safer in the hands of the caregiver. The most basic point to consider is consent to treatment, and surgery on a more specific ground as it relates to this question. Feeling safe while in the hospital first begins with the patient and then the caregiver’s context comes in. This is because, in order to begin any healthcare procedure, the patient must be willing to undertake the required actions that pertain to the procedure of treatment. This is the first step to determine that the patient is safe while in the hospital. Effectiveness and quality of care is another factor combination that determines how safe a patient is. The two are determined by a number of factors that the patient herself should actively consider in order to create a safe hospital environment for her and the caregiver during treatment, and this in case elective surgery. Speaking up when an unusual scenario arises is crucial to the patient’s safety in the hospital. The patient should observe the practices of the caregiver so that practices or actions are tailored towards promoting the patient’s welfare. Attention should be paid in the setting up of the elective surgery procedure, so that all required materials and surgical tools are well in place before hand. The caregivers responsible for the elective surgery procedure should give the patient sufficient information about the procedure so that the patient is well informed of what is expected of her. Other safety related issues to check for are the medication procedure, standard of the healthcare facility in the light of Joint Commission’s Standard and patient participation allowed by the caregivers. This information is relevant to the patient since every patient is entitled to quality and safe healthcare. What are some of the downfalls of obtaining patient information via the computer? How can these be minimized? Patient information collection and storage on computers is an embracement of modern or contemporary technology in the healthcare sector. Change is essential in healthcare so that the systems adopted are effective and efficient for both caregivers and patients. Amid this progress, obtaining patient information via the computer has its downfalls. One obvious downfall is cost. A number of aiding tools, systems and programs must be put in place. For an effective procedure of obtaining patient information, enormous resources should be availed for that. The overall activity has proved to be costly in the light of required aiding tools (Stead &Herbert, 2009). An error in information processing and recording and storage is another downfall. Patient information may be obtained via the computer and the whole activity is successful. However, the obtained information needs to be processed and stored in formats that allow easy access and periodical update of that information. This process of making the information electronic may be characterized by errors or untimely update of available information. Another downfall relates to computer software and programs training. The workforce charged with the duty of overseeing the success of computer based information gathering may not have the required expertise to handle patients via the computer. On the same note, privacy and confidentiality of patients is of primary concern. Where the two are not guaranteed or questioned, this system fails to achieve its objective. To minimize these downfalls, healthcare policies need to be put in place in order to build patient-caregiver confidence. This would greatly influence the success of such computer based systems. Financiers of healthcare need to be mobilized beforehand, prior to obtaining patient information via computer. What are some of the ethical issues presented by the use of electronic health records and point of care documentation? Electronic health records are patients’ health information that has been collected and stored on computers either for an individual or for a group of persons. On the other hand, point of care documentation relates to recording of patients’ health information and delivery of healthcare products and/or services at the time the patients seek care (Stead &Herbert, 2009). A number of ethical issues emerge from the two contexts above. Cost and quality of care is one of the ethical consequences of electronic health records and point of care documentation. Healthcare provision is expensive and this fact cannot be refuted. Healthcare providers are often faced by the challenge of matching costs to benefits so their legal and social obligations are fulfilled. However, doing so is a difficult task and the quality of care provided fails to match the costs. User deficiencies, unintended and undesired results constitute another ethical issue. Software and programs used for the two purposes aforementioned may not be well suited to the end user. As a result, the achieved objectives may deviate from what was actually expected. Issues of privacy and confidentiality may also arise, constituting a significant challenge in healthcare provision for both providers and seekers of healthcare products and services. Patient satisfaction is a pertinent issue in healthcare. This is primarily based on the rights of patients as well as on the codes of conduct applicable in healthcare provision. Patient rights dictate that patients are entitled to proper treatment regardless of their social, political or economic status. Patient satisfaction is therefore prioritized by law. If such procedures as the two mentioned above deviates from this requirements, then issues grounded on ethics arise. How are the pharmacy and radiology technologies impacting patient safety? Healthcare technologies are coming up fast and furious, improving healthcare provision and making caregiving services more effective. Amid these developments, there are concerns of patient safety especially when it comes to pharmacy and radiology technologies. Pharmacy technologies are employed in the development of pharmaceutical drugs, while radiology technologies are employed in visualizing patients’ bodies for health related complications and diagnoses thereafter. The safety and effectiveness of pharmaceutical drugs and radiology procedures has been evaluated and assessed as technologies related to them changes. Specifically, pharmacy technologies have been found to improve patient safety over time. However, due to the quick adoption of such technologies in the healthcare sector, counterfeit drugs have thrived, putting at risk the lives of patients. This has been realized in countries that lack strict pharmaceutical drugs and prior technology restrictions. Where such restrictions are upheld, patient safety is correlated to these technologies. Radiology technologies have constituted a bone of contention over the years. While such technologies have been said to improve healthcare product and service delivery, patient safety has not been fully addressed. Long term exposure to radiology and related technologies have been said to jeopardize patient safety. Cancers have been exacerbated by prolonged use of radiology technologies on patients (Stead &Herbert, 2009). While such technologies have made it easier to visualize internal bodies of patients, assess healthcare complications and consequently diagnose arising healthcare issues, the overall and long term safety of patients have been left unaccounted for. Has reliance on the new technologies improved nursing practice? Why or why not? Nursing practices require competence and effective systems of service delivery, prior to healthcare provision. Technologies that aid nursing practices have undergone immense modernization to meet the growing need of simplified healthcare systems that are consequently affordable and patient friendly. The impact of technology and its contribution in improving healthcare can be evaluated on the basis of technology adoption and use in healthcare. In the recent past, nursing practices have heavily relied on technology to realize effectiveness and efficiency of care giving and delivery. Specifically, modern technologies have been adopted in the examination and observation of patients in a bid to ease the time frame within which internal health complications can be realized. Such a move is an improvement in the nursing practice because where these technologies are not available; there have been inefficiencies in caregiving and follow-up procedures. Patient medical history is necessary in monitoring healthcare operations over time. New and improved technologies have aided this process through electronic collection, processing and storage of patient information. These new technologies have made it possible to hold stored information over long periods of time and have further improved ease in access when such information is needed. Healthcare performance and service delivery can therefore be monitored over time, enabling change of systems, improvements or even retaining those healthcare systems that work out best for patients and caregivers. On the same note, available patient history can be transmitted and shared across networks, such that different healthcare providers can monitor patient status at different times of healthcare service seeking across different providers. New technologies have therefore improved nursing practices. In what way will embedding evidence-based medicine and nursing guidelines into a computerized system improve practice? The quality of healthcare is determined by a number of factors, among them research and development in healthcare interventions. Evidence-based medicine integrates healthcare interventions that are primarily medical research findings. These findings are further used in formulation and implementation of nursing practices. Computerizing these activities and nursing guidelines is likely to improve practice due to a number of reasons, as described below. Access to medical information will be made easier and available information can be used by different practitioners who are allowed access to the computer systems that hold such information. The basic importance of this is that the research and development procedures in medicine and further integration of nursing guidelines in that context is likely to improve practice in the light of coordinated practices characteristic of evidence-based medicine. Information uniformity is promoted through such computerization of medicine activities. Embedding nursing guidelines in that context allows controlled use of information through regulatory activities that pertain to the used systems. On the same note, computerized systems are long term oriented and therefore medical research and developments and interventions therein are made available over long periods of time (Stead &Herbert, 2009). In this regard, already conducted research and identified findings can be improved by subsequent research, medical improvements and interventions. Nursing and related practices therefore are improved through the process of embedding evidence-based medicine and nursing guidelines into a computerized system. How does clinical event monitoring improve the delivery of public health services? Clinical event monitoring is primarily concerned with the detection and recognition of medication errors that arise in clinical and healthcare processes. There are common and basic types of errors that occur within nursing practices that consequently affect the quality of healthcare that patients receive. On the same note, it affects the effectiveness and efficiency with which nurses, clinicians or other caregivers discharge their duties and responsibilities. Public healthcare services are therefore influenced by the magnitude with such errors are accounted for. Healthcare facilities employ clinical event monitoring to scrutinize healthcare systems, programs and practices for errors especially in medication processes. Such event monitoring has also led to the formulation and implementation of rules that are tailored towards improving safety in clinical procedures. Public healthcare services have as a result been at a much better position in attaining the desired results, which encompass quality healthcare for all and proper working environments for healthcare givers and providers. Clinicians and medical quality management groups are always striving to improve medication safety for patients and everybody who seeks healthcare products and services (Stead &Herbert, 2009). In other words, the entire healthcare system is brought down to a single unit by event monitoring, so that every procedure or activity that relates to the provision of healthcare products and services is monitored, errors detected and measures to account for such errors established. As a result, healthcare services are better, of good quality and effectively lead to the realization of desired results. In other words, clinical event monitoring improves delivery of health services in the public context and beyond. Reference Stead, W. &Herbert, L. (2009). Computational technology for effective health care: Immediate steps and strategic directions. New York: National Academies Press. Read More