Facilitating Quality Patient Care

Safe and quality patient care is inevitable in the current healthcare system that seeks to positively affect the health outcomes of patients through different organizations. Nurse leaders must facilitate the provision of safe and effective care since nurses form the largest proportion of health care workers. Moreover, nurse leaders can remain current and follow the quality standards from organizations effectively by reading various recommendations from those establishments. Then, they can compare them to the available research evidence on patient care. Therefore, nurse leaders can discover the relevance of the recommendation in providing safe and quality patient care and further encourage nurses to adhere to the recommendations in their clinical practice. Proper monitoring of nursing practice can ensure that patients are getting the necessary therapeutic services that not only enhance their health status but also generally improve the quality of healthcare. Quality terms in healthcare, regulatory organizations, and nurse leader responsiveness are some of the factors that have increased the quality of healthcare and the safety of patients in medical settings.

Quality Terms in Healthcare

Value-based purchasing. Value-based purchasing is a payment method that links the payments of providers to improved performance. The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services [CMS.gov] (2015) ascertains that this method is useful because it facilitates accountability for both cost and quality of healthcare by medical workers. Additionally, CMS.gov (2015) asserts that this method of payment reduces any chances of offering inappropriate care to patients. Therefore, it only focuses on rewarding healthcare professionals that deliver quality services.

HCAHPS. HCAHPS is a standardized survey tool that healthcare providers can use to measure the perspectives of patients regarding the care that they receive in medical facilities. Additionally, CMS.gov (2015) claims that it maintains this tool and applies it specifically to adult inpatients. Furthermore, psychiatric patients are exempted from this tool. Thus, the latter is useful, as it can offer great insight on patient care in various hospital units.

QSEN. QSEN signifies Quality and Safety Education for Nurses. QSEN (2017) asserts that its main aim is to make medical attendants develop skills, attitudes, and knowledge that can help them to enhance the safety and quality of patient care. QSEN (2017) indicates that this approach can advance the services that nurses offer, which in turn can improve the quality of the healthcare system in their facilities. Therefore, the increased competence of nurses provided by QSEN is necessary to ensure patient safety and quality of healthcare.

PDCA. PDCA stands for Plan-Do-Check-At cycle. The Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (n.d.) ascertains that PDCA involves four steps and allows medical staff to implement change, address several issues in healthcare, and develop the processes that guarantee safety and quality of patient care. AHRQ (n.d.) claims that the PLAN phase encompasses identifying the change, and the DO phase incorporates conducting a pilot test. Then, the CHECK phase includes collecting all necessary data, and finally, the ACT phase deals with apply the change. Hence, this method can contribute to the fact that healthcare providers embrace the techniques that can improve the quality of healthcare.

Six Sigma. The Six Sigma method is useful as it secures quality and safe patient care through error prevention. According to Six Sigma Online (n.d.), this approach involves identifying priority tasks that can increase the quality of healthcare and addresses them first. The given method can enhance customer satisfaction and prevent omission of crucial interventions thus ensuring greater patient safety.

Quality and Regulatory Organizations

IOM. The Institute of Medicine (IOM) is important in guaranteeing patient safety, as it offers essential health services through its institutions. The IOM (2017) asserts that it produces human resources for vital health services such as healthcare institutions. Additionally, the IOM (2017) contends that it engages itself in numerous research projects that target to enhance health services. Therefore, the IOM is useful because it not only secures the higher quality of direct healthcare but also enlightens the public on various necessities in healthcare through research.

JCAHO. The Joint Commission on Accreditation and Healthcare is relevant as it reduces potential health risks and manages them to make sure that patients get essential health services. The Joint Commission (2017) states that JCAHO organizes patient safety efforts and strengthens the confidence of the communities in quality healthcare. Additionally, the Joint Commission (2017) ascertains that JCAHO offers better access to insurance coverage and then enhances staff recruitment in healthcare facilities. Considerably, JCAHO has many benefits that ensure that when patients receive quality health services, healthcare providers are satisfied as they discharge them.

CMS. The Centers for Medicaid and Medicare Services are among the organizations that guarantee the outstanding quality of health services. Medicare.gov (2017) asserts that CMS provides insurance for the elderly. Furthermore, Medicare.gov (2017) contends that CMS helps people with medical costs and administers children’s health insurance. Therefore, this establishment secures accessibility and affordability of health services thus ensuring the provision of essential medical services to many citizens. Most importantly, CMS must collaborate with other organizations to make sure that despite receiving quality services, patients also get safe healthcare.

Leapfrog. Finally, Leapfrog is useful since it aims at improving the quality of patient care by alerting the health care consumers to the hazards they are likely to face. The Leapfrog Group (2016) argues that it initiated the Leapfrog Hospital Safety Grade, which increased public awareness of better healthcare. The awareness has further resulted in the stronger commitment of hospitals to solve issues such as nosocomial infections that have significantly contributed to mortalities. Therefore, Leapfrog is important because it helps patients to participate in the efforts of providing quality and safety of healthcare.

Nurse Leader Responsiveness

Healthcare dashboard. A healthcare dashboard contains a succinct display of performance indicators that medical leaders can monitor to ensure improved healthcare delivery. Dowding et al. (2015) confirm that dashboards offer quick access to information thus facilitating proper monitoring of quality patient care. In this case, a nurse leader can put three indicators on the dashboard to enhance the quality and safety of patient care. Firstly, as an indicator drug administration can assist the nurse leader in monitoring the correct prescription of drugs in order to prevent medication errors. Secondly, as another indicator, interdisciplinary collaboration can facilitate the incorporation of various skills successfully in inpatient care. Finally, patient-centered care, which considers individuals’ views in decision-making, can enhance respect for a patient during the provision of healthcare services. Hence, these indicators can increase the quality and safety of patient care.

Integrate quality findings. A nurse leader has a duty of examining quality findings and assessing their relevance in healthcare. Then, the leader must combine only the relevant results in patient care and encourage other medical practitioners to utilize them. Dowding et al. (2015) argue that adhering to such integrated guidelines can improve patient care. Therefore, observance of different quality outcomes can contribute to greater quality of health services.

Monitor progress of quality initiatives. The nurse leader can only monitor the quality initiative when nurses are implementing them. Consequently, the leader must encourage his/her subordinates to follow the recommendations that can enhance the quality and safety of patient care. Then, the nurse leaders can assess the response of patients and medical attendants to the initiatives. Hence, leaders can understand any flaws in the initiatives, which can help them to offer relevant recommendations for improvement.

Conclusion

Safe and quality healthcare delivery is crucial to guaranteeing an advanced healthcare system. Various organizations are committed to ensuring that patients receive the best care possible from medical professionals. Therefore, such establishments have numerous services ranging from offering relevant guidelines to reimbursement. Healthcare providers, particularly nurses, must observe the quality initiatives from these organizations in order to improve the lives of patients that they manage.