Accountability in Health Care

Accountability means:” being accountable for one’s own action”. The American Nursing Association (ANA) states in its code that the nurse will assume accountability for individual nursing judgments and actions. Professional nurses are accountable in several areas including accountability to the public, client, profession, employer, and self (Hood, 2010, p. 307). All professional nurses have the responsibility to work within their scope of practice to provide the best possible care to patients. Nurses’ should have a thorough knowledge about their accountability in specific areas of practice. The level of responsibility and accountability depends on professional levels. A nursing supervisor has more responsibility than a charge- nurse. A

Be on time and ready for the unit report at 7 am. A unit patient diagnosed with acute gastroenteritis was assigned to my care. I introduced myself to the nurse responsible for the assigned patient and report was received by the third shift nurse about patient condition and requirements. Be able to incorporate prior skills learned while taking care and assessing patient.

Critically analyse how clinical governance can ensure accountability of individuals and teams and that nursing practice is safe and of a high standard?

Organizational culture shapes and reinforces certain employee attitudes and behaviors by creating a system of control over employees.

Accountability is important in the health care industry; it holds an individual accountable day in and day out for his and her own tasks. Holding a person accountable for their actions can also assist in creating accountability for the department, unit, organization, and industry level of the organization. Accountability is considered to be a performance management system to improve and measure quality in the health care industry (O'Hagan & Persaud, 2009).

Accountability of nurses is clearly pinpointed and well within the realm of law. A nurse is accountable to all the patients he or she is expected to attend to. Such accountability as underlined by common law helps promote safety of all patients.

The Accountable Care Collaborative is Health First Colorado’s program that is the primary resource to provide enhanced coordinated care. The three primary goals of the ACC program are to better health, improve the experience of both the providers and the ACC members, and to contain costs. The ACC connects primary care medical providers (PCMPs), the statewide data and analytics contractor (SDAC) and the Regional Care Collaborative Organizations

The Code of Ethics furnishes a definitive model of conduct. The standard of conduct is entrenched in associations, affiliations, confidentiality, and commitment with health care professionals. The Code of Ethics for healthcare quality professionals is dedicated to routine enhancement and preserving integrity by identifying individual accountability and ethical obligation to patients, medical providers, employees, health care organizations, and the community (Oddo, 2011). Ethics are not voluntary in the health care field. They are a vital and central part of medicine. Ethical codes form and assemble moral atmosphere and allotting the ethical accountability and

Accountability has become an important field in the health care programs because it involves the events and procedures for not only mitigating but also taking responsibility for the actions taking place in an organization. This is crucial because how the funds are handled may directly affect how the patient is treated or the quality of treatment the patient gets. Accountability has also been known to have a robust influence on how one makes decisions. This has been proved true in the study of social cognition, organizational dynamics, and human interaction. This shows the importance of accountability in the health care systems and how the employee's accountability is measured. It is also important to analyze how the checks and balances procedure is like. Accountability also affects the organization's working culture hence the importance to maintain a good working culture and avoid one that is blamed in health care.

In any organisation particularly health care risk management affects everybody, and each individual should be clear about their responsibilities for managing risks. Responsibilities should therefore be specified in employee’s job descriptions or in relevant policies and procedural documents. The accountability frame work for risk

Healthy culture is achieved by creating a thriving working environment, which involves the individual, team, and management to achieve this. Thriving environment consists of employees feeling safe, comfortable, and happy to create a respectable workplace. An organization does not have to make significant structural changes to achieve a healthy culture. Rather, it starts with a manager/supervisor simply acknowledging a job well done, and encouragement or support rendered to employees as needed. If the employee does not get a sense of caring or support from their supervisor, then it can create as Thomas and Hersen (2002) described as “a culture of blame, which dominates real problems and symptoms of stress remain concealed” (Thomas & Hersen,

It is important to note first, what accountability is. I will state why it is important as well as go over scenarios in dealing with accountability.

A healthy culture is crucial to the success of any organization. Creating a healthy organizational environment is the responsibility of the organizational managers and leaders in collaboration with their employees. One strategy that an organizational manager can employ in order to create a healthy culture is to provide an atmosphere of personal responsibility and accountability. By creating an environment where teams can hold each other accountable while celebrating successes as a team intensify loyalty, commitment and dedication to the organization. In addition, an honest and accepting atmosphere increases productivity and inspires creativity, maximizing the organization’s

An organization’s culture governs day to day behavior. This type of power may be seen as a control mechanism, which businesses use to manipulate internal and external perception. Every organization has a set of assumed understandings that must be adopted and implemented by new employees in order for them to be accepted. Conformity to the culture becomes the primary basis for reward by the organization. “The role of culture in influencing employee behavior appears to be increasingly important in today’s workplace, as organizations have widened spans of control, flattened structures, introduced teams, reduced

A strong positive organizational culture develops from employee awareness of the distinct differences between their company and other companies along with company mindfulness and embracing cultural diversity of its employees. As long as the organizational uniqueness of companies is positive, company pride among employees expands and improves the employees’ willingness to learn. Conversely, disinterested employees lack commitment to their company and lack desire to learn, making training more difficult.