Cost and Quality in Healthcare When it comes to improving healthcare, one must be focused not only on quality but also on cost. The question is then raised: Will higher cost result in higher quality care or will higher quality care help control costs? It is no secret that healthcare is incredibly expensive in the United States. Despite healthcare in the United States being 50 – 200% more expensive that in other economically developed countries, life expectancy rates and quality indicator scores are also lower (Burke & Andrew, 2014). This paper will provide highlights of a couple of current initiatives both in the private and public sectors that address cost and quality of healthcare as well as implications for nurses regarding evidence based practice relative to cost and quality. Cost and Quality in the Private Sector There has been much progress to support better quality healthcare in recent years. Focus is around the development of quality measures, thanks to private organizations such as the National Committee for Quality Assurance (NCQA). The NCQA developed what is called the patient-centered medical home model. This is a model of care that emphasizes care coordination and communication to transform primary care into what patients want and need. “The NCQA Patient-Centered Medical Home (PCMH) Recognition is the most widely adopted model for transforming primary care practices into medical homes (NCQA Patient-Centered Medical Home, 2015).” Following the
Rising health care costs became an issue after the Medicare and Medicaid programs were formed in 1965 and have continued to be a factor in the United States economy since then. “By1970, U.S. government expenditures for health care services and supplies had grown by 140%, from $7.9 billion to $18.9 billion.”() By the 1990s the annual increase in the government health care expenditures was finally brought under control and has fluctuated between a 5% and 8% increase each year since then. This essay will discuss the different factors contributing to the rising costs of health care in the United States, as well as how the cost of health care affects the accessibility and quality of medical care throughout American history.
The articles I chose for my annotated bibliography were about healthcare cost and quality. The theme in many of these articles was about healthcare cost and does it affect patients experience. In some settings like hospitals, the cost of quality affects patient experience. The largest component of the U.S. Gross Domestic Product goes to healthcare spending (17% in 2009), and yet the quality is unsatisfactory. It was also interesting to find out that more people die each year in the United States from medical errors than from highway accidents, breast cancer, or AIDS (National Academy of Science's Institute of Medicine, 2002).
The primary care practice is essential to improve the care of our population, our current system is fragmented, but it does show potential for improvement. The Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality has listed some areas that will help improve our system. One is “the need for external infrastructure to help primary care practices develop quality improvement” this is done with support to the quality capacity (Agency For Healthcare Research and Quality, 2015). Quality care will include the coordination of care within the system, as well as understanding what needs the patient will have
Patient-Centered Medical Homes (PCMH) are growing in popularity as the right thing to do improve patient care. PCMH are growing in popularity, as there is early evidence of their effectiveness (Egge, M. 2012). The PCMH concept has been widely promoted as a way to enhance primary care and deliver better care to patients with chronic conditions. This model of care has stimulated the attention of payers, Medicaid policy makers, physicians, and patient advocates, as it has the potential to address several of the limitations of the current healthcare system (Wang, J. et al 2014). Currently, primary care in the United States is focused on acute and episodic illness, it inadvertently limits comprehensive, coordinated, preventive and chronic care (Bleser, W. et al 2014). The PCMH address these limitations through organizing patient care, emphasizing team work, and coordinating data tracking (Bleser, W. et al 2014). A PCMH and HMO have some similarities but are markedly different.
Quality Improvement (QI) is an organizational approach leading to the quality of patient care and patient services through use of specific guidelines, principles, and methods to ensure quality of care for every patient and health care facility throughout the world. Quality outcomes focus on the principles of quality management. These measurements investigate the quality of care, patient outcomes and consumer needs, through being part of the participant group. This quality improvement discussion will review the foundational frameworks of QI and explanation of each framework in detail. Included in this QI report will be
As the continued support grows the PCPCC, the health care sector is recognizing the role of the medical home model, Accountable Care Organizations(ACO), many entities are embracing the model and performing better. According to Center of Medicare and Medicaid, the medical home model shows that there is an improvement cost effectiveness, which helps practitioners deliver quality care and advanced approaches to care coordination, care teams, and chronic disease management. As evaluations of ACOs, integrated health systems, and the medical neighborhood continue, the Patient Center Medical Home will be essential to driving improvements in cost, quality, and outcomes. [3]
Quality patient centered care is vital to a hospital or clinic’s ability to treat whole patients. Dabney and Tzeng (2013) address the necessity to implement patient-centered care into clinic and hospital settings. The article clarifies what patient-centered care and service quality is by consolidating many works and sighting benefits medical professionals can observe in their practice.
Medicaid is a vital lifeline for some 72 million Americans. Two-thirds of all Medicaid spending supports senior citizens and persons with disabilities. Cutting Medicaid would jeopardize the quality of healthcare, long-term services, and nursing home care for tens of millions of Americans. There are significant cost issues in America’s healthcare system that must be effectively addressed, but these challenges will not be remedied by benefit cuts to vulnerable
The nation health care system is facing significant challenges that requiring immediate major reforms. Lately close attention is drawn to the uninsured Americans, such as the most painful dilemmas of health care system. The problem of uninsured and uncompensated care continues significantly contribute to the rise of the health care cost and has been a chief topic for public debates and political campaigns for a long time. The purpose of this paper is to describe the current extent of uninsured care and provide the strategies from the nursing point of view how to change the trajectory of this prevalent issue in the USA health care system.
The quality of care In the United States Health Care System, unlike a lot of people’s perceptions, is not the best in the world. In fact, Rose Ann DeMoro, the Executive Director of National Nurses United, Which happens to be the nation’s largest professional association and union for registered nurses, wrote in “How US Private Insurance Healthcare is Failing,” “A study published [in June 2011] from the university of Washington in collaboration with researchers at Imperial College London found life expectancy rates in eighty percent of US counties were fare behind the standard set in the top ten nations” (DeMoro 2).Also, in a study shown in “Forbes” America’s quality of care ranked fifth out of eleven industrial nations: Australia, Canada,
Cost, the number one thing on people’s mind nowadays. People’s worry about the cost of healthcare usually leads to them being uninsured. For my healthcare system, I want it to publicly funded by public taxes (private donations are always welcome), similar to how healthcare in Europe is modeled. For check ups and routine things, the cost of those visits will be covered, if one visits a preferred doctor provided by the healthcare company. But if the medical expenses go over a certain amount, the patient will have to pay a percent of the cost. Such as if you go to the doctor a yearly check up, that visit will be covered. If the doctor happens to find a brain tumor and surgery is required and the costs exceed the amount able to be covered, a percentage of the remaining amount will be billed to the patient and the rest paid for by the healthcare system. I believe this is the fairest way of rationalizing and dividing up the cost and the money of a healthcare system. Routine things should not cost an arm and a leg, I believe they should be free to promote good health and wellness. But at the same time, the system should not be completely free, because then taxes would be ridiculously high. Also, to make sure patients are not getting ripped off, I would impose price control. This would only affect doctors that are under our healthcare system. Private practices can continue to run independently since they are not funded by the public. Although the public doctors will get paid less,
Health care cost and quality is a major topic of conversation in the United States (U.S.). With the cost of health care spiraling out of control, the U.S. is spending an average of $9,086 per person per year on health care (Mahon, 2015)Click and drag to move. Although, the U.S. spending on health care is higher than the other high-income nations across the world, the U.S. has the lowest life expectancy (Mahon, 2015). In the U.S., health care cost and quality are impacted by both public and private agencies. Public agencies are organizations that have an impact on the entire country; while private agencies make an impact on certain communities or states. In this paper, we are going to take a closer look at the roles of these agencies in how
The U.S. spends more money on health care than any other country in the world, yet most Americans do no receive adequate health care. Many factors have contributed to this problem. One major factor is cost. The price of health care has risen tremendously in the previous years and is expected to continue to rise in the years to come.
The health care reform in the United States has increased the patient quality of care and cost -effectiveness. However, it has affected to the roles of nurse incredibly. According to American Academy of Family Physicians (2012), the patient -centered medical home (PCMH) has become a fast-growing and remarkable model care. More organizations such as Utilization Committee for Quality Assurance and the Joint Commission currently has credited the PCMH led by nurse practitioner (NP) (Stokowski, 2012).
Although the Patient Centered Medical Homes health care model has been setup with a mission of organizing a critical care for patients and building better relationships that physicians could teach gain additional knowledge on what a patient is going through with their conditions. “David Keepnews (2013) reports Satisfaction has traditionally been measured with a variety of instruments and methods, with little agreement or consistency regarding how to interpret findings, how to utilize them, or even what is being measured. Despite this, providers of health and health-related services have devoted considerable resources to collecting and analyzing satisfaction data. Satisfaction scores have been used to identify quality problems and target interventions