Quality health care

Definitions of the quality of medical care are no longer left to clinicians who decide for themselves what technical performance constitutes “good care.” Name one (1) other dimension of quality care and why is it important?

Timeliness – Refers to the ability of getting health care services in a quick and timely manner so that no much time is lost while seeking health care services and also includes the ability of getting all health care services at one point in time without necessarily having multiple visits to the facility. Finally, timeliness as a dimension of a quality health care system will ensure that one’s illness is treated for a specific timeframe and if that is not possible it is referred to the next level of care so as prevent the illness from advancing further.

What is the primary method of continuous quality improvement (CQI) in health care, and what is its underlying premise?

Benchmarking which refers to the process of practices and services against the best performing organization. It is based on voluntary and active collaboration among many organizations to create a spirit of competition and to apply best practices. The premise of benchmarking is that one organization is compared to another that is performing exceptionally so as to motivate self to reach that level or standard of care. For successful benchmarking the focus is essentially on careful preparation of the process, monitoring of the relevant indicators, staff involvement and inter-organizational visits.

Since an ever-increasing amount of research is funded by commercial companies, what is your opinion on a requirement for authors of scientific studies who receive income from these companies to disclose funding sources in their scientific publications?

In my opinion, disclosure of funding sources in the scientific publications is a sign of a good will to the funding sources by the authors. This is because it shows their appreciation for having gotten the financial support from the companies that have sponsored them so as to have their own publication. Moreover, the identification of the companies in the authors’ publication is also a basis for recognizing the companies’ effort to engage in partnerships that are constructive to the scientific field and thus bettering the environment of the human beings.

Today’s not-for-profit hospitals and health systems are commonly multi-billion dollar tax-exempt organizations. What is your position on the new federal scrutiny upon, and reporting requirements for justifying the charitable missions of not-for-profit hospitals and health systems?

My position on this matter is that the scrutiny and reporting requirements is an important step towards protecting the consumer of health care from over exploitation by such institution and health care systems. The exploitation mainly comes in the form of pricing the health care services highly and thus limiting the care to the haves that is the rich. Even though the rich are served they still receive the services at a high cost that may not be sustainable in the future. It is thus important for scrutiny so as to enhance consumer protection in the long last.

  In 1999, the Institute of medicine report, To Err is Human, generated a brief flurry of concerns about avoidable hospital deaths. While progress has been made in addressing system errors and deficiencies, it remains inconsistent across the nation’s hospitals. Fourteen years after this report, is it time for the professions, payers and the public to demand corrections of systems problems in an accountable, transparent and publicly disclosed manner? What form can or should these demands take?

It is indeed true that the time for a common voice to be heard has come in that all the mentioned groups need to channel all their efforts cumulatively so as to push for amendments to the health care system in a more open manner. The demands can take a negotiation approach with the major stakeholders of health so as to push for changes in the healthcare system in a more subtle way. Alternatively, if negotiations are not fruitful the professional bodies can adopt more aggressive approaches that will ultimately push the government to make changes that will benefit the health sector as a whole.