Module 2- Management Strategies

Motivational strategies are very important to individuals in the working field. People should be rewarded for their behavior that is acceptable, and which can also enhance performance and motivate them. This article was very interesting to me title reads “Friendly workplace linked to longer life”. Researchers at Tel Aviv University found that people who felt that they had the support of their colleagues and generally positive social interactions at work were less likely to die over a 20-year period than those who reported a less friendly work environment (O'Connor, 2011). Studies have proven that getting along with your colleagues at work may do more than boost your productivity, and can extend your life.

A stressful job can cause a person to become mentally, physically, and emotionally unstable. The manger should have some type of organizational behavior to see how people act in the organizations to improve employee’s behavior. One thing they noticed was that the risk was only affected by a person’s relationship with his or her peers, and not with that person’s supervisors. The way people viewed their relationships with their bosses had no impact on mortality (O’Connor, 2011). I certainly believe that a lack of a relationship with co-workers over a period of time can cause a person to be unhappy and withdrawal from their workplace. You can live longer if you are enjoying life and it’s filled with happiness.

References

O'Connor,Anahad. ( 2011, 5 Aug) Friendly workplace lined to longer life.
              The New York Times

Retrieved from
http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/08/05/friendly-workplace-linked-to-longer-life/

Module 2-Healthcare Managment Strategies-Turning employees into problem solvers

http://hbswk.hbs.edu/item/6279.html

The Institute of Medicine published To Err is Human ten years ago (Hanna, 2010). The report caused medical mistakes to be in the spotlight and become a hot topic (Hanna, 2010). We all make mistakes, but it is an important part of management to recognize those mistakes, and come up with solutions so that the mistakes are not repeated. Medical mistakes cost nine to fifteen billion dollars annually (Hanna, 2010). So what is management to do to decrease these numbers?

According to the article, management needs to prompt their employees to speak up (Hanna, 2010). If an employee notices something that is a potential mistake, tell a manager, so that they can address the problem and find a solution. In 2010, Harvard did a study to see what types of tactics management could use to encourage employees to speak up. According to the study, patient safety campaigns are a good start (Hanna, 2010). Instituting these types of campaigns increased the number of employees to speak up by five percent (Hanna, 2010). In addition to this, managers that “practiced what they preached’, and reported problems themselves had numbers higher than this (Hanna, 2010).

The next step is for management to evaluate the types of problems that are happening, and determine if they are repetitive problems that have an easy solution. Evaluation is key in management, and can be helpful in solving a multitude of problems (Hanna, 2010).

The last thing that the author talks about is recognizing what she calls “front line employees”(Hanna, 2010). These are employees that are willing to go the extra mile to help their department limit the amount of mistakes they make. These employees are not perfect, and may make mistakes themselves, but are willing to take criticism, and problem solve when needed. These employees also have watchful eyes, and report things to management that should be reported (Hanna, 2010). They avoid near-miss situations, and help management when necessary.

Works Cited

Hanna, J. (2010, Aug 30). Havard Business School. Retrieved from hbs.edu.

Learning Module 1: Achieving Health Care

Healthcare in the United States is changing constantly with different reforms from different ideas of the president and Congress. I found this article about how achieving health care reform and how physicians can help.  There are two threats in particular that put reform at risk: conflicting doctrines (regarding the creation of a new public insurance option and government support for comparative-effectiveness studies) and opposition to change among some current stakeholders (Fisher,2009). The good thing about a physician position they have the chance to wait and see what happens or to lead the change our country needs. The article explains that physicians should first help to create a shared vision that could overcome doctrinal divides — and bring providers together to create a system better aligned both with public needs and with providers' fundamental interests and values (Fisher,2009).

I think the Healthcare reform is a challenge for anyone that has the opportunity to make changes because you will never be able to satisfy everybody in the U.S with different Acts for Healthcare.
If stakeholders can agree on such a vision of health care reform, perhaps we could shift our focus from the conflict over whether a new public plan should be created to a more constructive insistence that all health plans, whether public or private. However, neither physicians nor anyone else on the front lines can improve care much on their own. Their most important source of support for improvement is the third level described by the IOM — the health care organizations that house almost all clinical microsystems and can ensure coordination among them (Fisher,2009). The article explains that physicians can help by their support and help to develop integrated systems of care. So I feel like the U.S. Healthcare can become better over time if the physicians and congress, and legislation become one.

Reference

Fisher, Elliot. (2009, June, 9) Achieving Health Care Reform-How Physicians Can Help

http://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMp0903923

Leadership in Today's Changing Healthcare Environment

 While rising costs have driven the healthcare industry to think outside the box, it is only by having good leadership that this can be accomplished. It is one thing to be able to see the overall plan for the future, but another to be able to make it happen. Good leaders are multifaceted in their ability foresee the future or at least the direction they perceive the future to be (Meyer & Ron, 2013). Another characteristic in a good leader is their ability to be flexible and have the capability to change directions when the time comes to make the needed adjusts to adapt to the environment of the present. Good leaders also know that they need to provide the tools needed to help those managers and others in the leadership roles be able to accomplish their tasks at hand. Some of these important tools are time, resources, and the authority to get things done (Meyer & Ron, 2013). This article is about the new model of Accountable Care Organizations which include Medicare and Medicaid payer bases. The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services define an ACO as "an organization of healthcare providers that agrees to be accountable for the quality, cost, and overall care of Medicare beneficiaries who are enrolled in the traditional fee-for-service program who are assigned to it (Meyer & Ron, 2013).”  This is a tremendous undertaking by an organization, so many choose to organize affiliations with other facilities in order to incorporate all the needed services in order to make this happen. Of course by doing so, they must research, plan, and make wise decisions about who to affiliate with and when in order to accomplish these goals and stay within their focused directional vision. As long as schema within all the affiliated entities are the same in general, they will be able to stay on track and provide all the services needed without great expenditure, which is a cost savings provision as well (Buchbinder and Shanks, 2011).

References

Buchbinder, S., and Shanks, N. Introduction to health care management. 2^nd edition. Burlington,MA: Jones and Bartlett Learning, 2011. Print.

Meyer, M., & Ron, A. (2013). Leadership is the key to a successful accountable care organization. American Journal of Managed Care, Retrieved from http://www.ajmc.com/conferences/NAMCP_2012/Leadership-Is-the-Key-to-a-Successful-Accountable-Care-Organization/

http://www.ajmc.com/conferences/NAMCP_2012/Leadership-Is-the-Key-to-a-Successful-Accountable-Care-Organization/

Management Strategies

Planning and evaluation is always at the front line of health care today. Take information as an example. In the past there were log books and paper charts to keep track of patients, patient’s medications, and test results. Today there is extensive planning on the best way to collect patient information and also great planning in the evaluation of this information. Over the last decade, pharmaceutical companies have been aggregating years of research and development data into medical databases, while payers and providers have digitized their patient records (Kayyali, Kuiken, & Knott, 2013). Recent technical advances have made it easier to collect and analyze information from multiple sources—a major benefit in health care, since data for a single patient may come from various payers, hospitals, laboratories, and physician offices (Kayyali, Kuiken, & Knott, 2013). With these changes it is important of health-care stakeholders to compile and exchange information to keep up with the needs of patients and quality of service.

While health-care costs may be paramount in big data’s rise, but now care is based more on evidence based need. Physicians have traditionally used their judgment when making treatment decisions, but in the last few years there has been a move toward evidence-based medicine, which involves systematically reviewing clinical data and making treatment decisions based on the best available information (Kayyali, Kuiken, & Knott, 2013). Although the health-care industry has been the last to join the big data—partly because of concerns about patient confidentiality—it could soon catch up. If stakeholders are not on board they can find themselves left behind in the healthcare field.  Patient data is of great value due to it shows the trends and needs of today’s healthcare patients while provided much needed data for physicians and hospitals.

References

Kayyali, B., Kuiken, S. V., & Knott, D. (2013, April). The Big-Data Revolution in US Health Care: Accelerating Value and Innovation. Retrieved from McKinsey Insights on Health Systems: http://www.mckinsey.com/insights/health_systems/the_big-data_revolution_in_us_health_care

http://www.mckinsey.com/insights/health_systems/the_big-data_revolution_in_us_health_care

U.S. Health Care

Health Care in the United States is undergoing drastic changes as a result of the Affordable Care Act (ACA).  One of the main goals of health reform is to expand medical coverage to more Americans.

One way it is accomplishing this is by allowing parents to carry their young adult children on their medical plans up to the age of 26.  The law also allows young adult children who are married, attending school, not living with their parents and eligible to enroll in their own employer’s plan to continue coverage under thier parents medical plan (U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, 2013).  However, one stipulation is that they must not be financially dependent on their parents if they are not attending school nor have employment.  

The whole purpose is to increase the access to more people and reduce the amount of uninsured Americans.  An article published by New England Journal of Medicine reported that since the law took into effect, an increase of emergency room visits increased by 3.1%.  In a one year period it was calculated that $147 million in medical costs were now covered by newly insured young adults (Harris, Ph.D, et al., 2013).  Emergency room care is very expensive and increasing the coverage to young adult children will save money for both the parent and the adult child.  

The data shows, in at least one area of health reform, it is helping to increase coverage to young adults who otherwise would have gone without medical coverage needed to seek emergency care.

References

Harris, Ph.D, K., Finegold, PhD, K., Kellermann, M.D., M.P.H., A., Endelman, B.Sc.Adv., L., Sommers, M.D., PhD, B. D., & Mulcahy, PhD, M.P.P., A. (2013, June 07). Insurance Coverage of Emergency Care for Young Adults under Health Reform. Retrieved from www.nejm.org: www.nejm.org

U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. (2013, June 7). Young Adult Coverage. Retrieved from HealthCare.gove: HealthCare.gov

EHR Incentives

US Healthcare Systems

Module 1 – Article Summary

Jon Reed

Conn, J. (2013). Riding the wave

            This article deals with the government’s requirements for electronic health records (EHR), and how different health care providers are taking vastly different approaches. Some providers are striving to get to and stay on the cutting edge of information technology (IT), while others are still using paper records with the vast majority of providers left somewhere in between. One health group in California which includes a 409 bed hospital and multiple providers working out of multiple facilities plans on implementing a bar-code medication administration system and setting up a data warehouse for patient records, which should enable it to track patients as they move through the system, manage the overall health of its patient population and learn from its experiences (Conn, 2013). The hospital also plans to add a patient portal, which it sees as key to involving patients in their own care and a crucial part in improving population health while lowering overall healthcare costs (Conn, 2013). I thought this related to the article that James posted about our ranking in population health.  Some analysts are predicting a huge explosion in IT spending over the next few years from providers doing more of what this California provider is doing. On the flip side the more pessimistic analysts are predicting that these expenditures are strictly due to the government incentive programs that have already spent most of the funds.  Many are predicting that as soon as the government mandates are met that the care providers will turn to making all of the budget cuts possible due to lower reimbursement checks causing them to operate on thinner margins (Conn, 2013). Who knows what will happen in the next few years as the government mandates for providers and the government insurance programs go into effect.  From this article I gathered that there are a lot of predictions, but no one really knows. The one thing that I think we can all be sure of is that there are changes coming to our field, and we all hope they are good ones.

Reference

Conn, J. (2013). Riding the wave. Modern Healthcare,43(20), 6-7.

Retrieved from 

http://ehis.ebscohost.com.zeus.tarleton.edu:81/ehost/delivery?sid=f33f45fe-0b82-   4c9c-b11b-   http://ehis.ebscohost.com.zeus.tarleton.edu:81/ehost/detail?sid=f33f45fe-0b82-4c9c-b11b-b3195a4388f5%40sessionmgr112&vid=4&hid=6&bdata=JnNpdGU9ZWhvc3QtbGl2ZQ%3d%3d#db=a9h&AN=87693406