Importance of Accountability Paper

The successful evolution of this organizational structure in a competitive marketplace has required a close partnership between managers and physicians supported by a culture of physician group accountability for quality and efficiency. An overarching agenda for achieving excellence focuses on high-impact health conditions, provides goal-oriented tools to analyze population data, proactively identifies patients in need of intervention, supports systematic process improvements, and promotes collaboration between patients and professionals to improve health.

Quality management is essential to the success of the quality improvement of the health care industry. “Management uses management and planning tools to organize the decision making process and create a hierarchy when faced with competing priorities “( Ransom, et al., 2008). Quality measures should have these goals: effective, safe, efficient, patient-centered, equitable, and timely care (Quality Measures, Center for Medicare & Medicaid Services, 2011).

​Kaiser Health News recently published an article on a new trend in healthcare. This trend introduces the Accountable Care Organization (ACO). The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid services defines it as “groups of doctors, hospitals, and other health care providers, who come together voluntarily to give coordinated high quality care to their Medicare patients” (“Accountable Care Organization,” 2015). According to the Affordable Care Act (ACA), the goal of the ACO is to be able to share health cost-savings with providers who are able to save money by eliminating unnecessary procedures and reduce health costs while increasing quality of care. ACOs make health professionals become more accountable in maintaining good-quality, coordinated healthcare for a patient through a value-based system that is evaluated through a number of criteria and benchmarks (Ronai, 2011).

The purpose of this paper is to discuss the importance of accountability, communication, and timeliness because I was late to accountability formation. I need to be aware of what can happen when I make irresponsible decisions and how the repercussions can negatively affect me now, but also in the future.

When Obama was sworn into presidency he implemented many new healthcare initiatives in order to reform the quality of care and strive forward towards having healthcare be available to everyone. The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act was a significant effort to expand healthcare to all citizens, but the part of the act that is not as well known is the proposal of Accountable Care Organizations (ACOs). Accountable Care Organizations are an initiative for providing better, more universal healthcare throughout all stages of life, especially focusing on the care of Medicare beneficiaries. An Accountable Care Organization is a network of doctors, nurses, hospitals, and health care providers that all agree to give coordinated care to Medicare patients by having responsibility of the cost and quality of patient care. The goal of these organizations is to have a group of people that all know the patient’s history and, therefore, through transitions the patient is able to receive quicker and higher quality of care for less cost of both the patient and provider. The effectiveness of Accountable Care Organizations depends upon the cost-effectiveness, professionals voluntarily giving care, and, most importantly, the way in which it affects patient care.

The white paper, “The Work Ahead: Activities and Costs to Develop an Accountable Care Organization”, prepared by Keith D. Moore and Dean C. Coddington for the American Hospital Association

Healthcare organizations have a responsibility to its consumers and various stakeholders to ensure only the highest quality care is delivered. Quality measures such as performance measurement and quality improvement processes play a critical role in helping organizations achieve quality outcomes. This paper will contrast performance measurement and quality improvement processes. In addition, this paper will discuss a healthcare organization, Gulf Coast Medical Center, its mission and QI goals, and the role of the consumer and stakeholders in the QI process.

The U.S. healthcare system has considerably transitioned from a period of traditional care to managed care to accountable care. The success of the accountable care regime would largely depend on the ability of ACOs to deliver on promises of cost reduction and quality improvement. And if it does, to sustain the feat. Given annual changes and additions to its forms and measures, ACOs are still in formation and at this stage, it may be untimely to tell if they are indeed the unobtanium of healthcare. Its aim of managing the basic elements of care – cost and quality all in one piece definitely comes with challenges which have been discussed. Nevertheless, it would take time for the health system to completely adjust to the period of accountable

According to Err is Human: Building a Safer Health Care System, thousands of Americans die annually due to medical errors and hundreds of thousands are victims of a non-fatal medical errors or injuries (Kongstvedt, 2013). With that being said, health care is composed of three main components: quality, access, and cost (Tabish, 2009). High quality care could prevent many of these fatalities or never events that occur within the health care organization. Historically speaking, many health care changes and improvements in quality of care have occurred due to quality management and quality assurance. To fully understand how quality is achieved and maintained, it is important to dissect these two programs or processes. This paper will analyze the key components of a quality management program as well as discuss characteristics that distinguish a quality management program from traditional quality assurance.

Having standards are importance in measuring the outcomes and effectiveness of a health care system.

Certainly, Accountable Care System(ACS) or accountable Care Organization (ACO), which is an entity that can implement organized process for improving quality and controlling the cost of care, and can also then be held accountable for these care results and the resultant costs associated with the outcomes. In this system, outpatient, rehab, long-term care, and even palliative care would be the responsibility of the ACS (Berkowitz 2017, page 37)

The prevailing paradigm in health care can usually be summed up in one word. In the 1970s and 1980s, the word was evidence; in the first decade of the 21st century, the word was quality. The paradigm shift from the efficiency frontier to a value frontier is occurring in healthcare. A value frontier is the linking of quality and efficiency data to identify optimum levels of healthcare performance. (Harrison, 2010) Thus the value considers not only efficiency but also quality. Continuous Quality Improvement (CQI) is the idea that no service or process is perfect and that an organization must continually strive to eliminate errors from its system to get closer to perfection. (Harrison, 2010) This requires assessment of processes and setting standards to monitor the quality of the system. Value should always be defined around the customer, and in a well-functioning health care system, the creation of value for patients should determine the rewards for all other actors in the system. (Porter, 2010)

Accountability is “the obligation of an individual or organization to account for its activities, accept responsibility for them, and to disclose the results in a transparent manner” (Jennings, 2014). Accountability is essential to establish a successful healthcare organization. To ensure accountability, all team members have to understand their roles and responsibilities in the organization. Table 2 and table 3 clearly defines the roles and responsibilities of each team member. At every weekly project meeting, accountability will be discussed between all team members. Expectations will be set and goals will be reviewed to ensure all deadlines and objectives are being met. The progress of the project will be tracked and every team member will receive feedback on their progress. The team will have a mutual focus, all decisions will be made with the best interest of telemedicine and everyone will be collectively responsible for performance.

Research is an essential element of any effective healthcare system. Accountability may best be served by building a true system, including the discovery and testing of new medical treatments and diagnostics new drugs, medical devices, and vaccines, all of which must be rigorously and systematically studied through clinical trials for safety and effectiveness. Leaders are accountable for their employees and should foster a working culture to ensure that accountability prevails over culpability. Accountability in the healthcare organizations helps in the control of abuse and misuse of public authority, resources, and ensures the population that resources are effectively use as well as proper exercising of authority.

Another principle that shapes quality and accreditation in healthcare organizations is performance. “Performance measurement is intended to provide health care organizations