Future Challenges for Healthcare (Essay Sample)

Future Challenges for Health Care Management
[Name of Student]
[Name of Institution]
Future Challenges for Health Care Management
Analyses based on previous occurrences and current situations present an almost true picture of prospective occurrences. In the 1980s, health care institutions predicted possible improvements in various parts of the industry with a number of challenges in others by the twenty-first century. Some of these included the rise of advanced technologies, increased numbers of health care physicians, rising numbers of elderly patients, and controlled costs in health care management (Schuring, 2013). Despite the fact that some of these predictions have emerged as projected, others have failed to comply with these predictions. Instead of having surplus physicians, the health care industry continues to face large deficits of the same across the world. Similarly, health care costs remain high and unaffordable to many patients (Soyez, 2015). Predictably, the future challenges for health care management include managing rising operational costs, handling a growing number of elderly patients in need of health care services, and availing an adequate number of physicians to handle the increasing number of patients in need of services.
Markedly, the twenty-first century health care industry remains characterized by numerous financial inadequacies. While terminal and chronic illnesses have increased tremendously, the cost of living has also risen. Coupled with high rates of inflation, drugs and equipment in the health care sector have become expensive and unaffordable to some parts of global populations. An example of an illness that remains expensive to control is that of cancer. Irrespective of involved types of cancer, patients with related conditions have to undergo chemotherapy, radiotherapy, and surgeries to get complete treatments (Denton, 2013). Some of these procedures are too expensive for larger parts of the populations to undergo. On the part of hospitals, procuring hospital equipment has become quite expensive. Predictable trends indicate that this may persist into the future. As a result, health care institutions have to develop ways of controlling operational costs and increasing revenue (Soyez, 2015).
Although the overall number of patients has persistently grown over the years, that of individuals above sixty-five years has had the most notable rise. This is because of improved health care procedures and innovative technologies for managing various health care conditions. Death rates for individuals below sixty-five years have reduced significantly (Denton, 2013). However, when individuals get to ages above sixty-five years, they develop chronic and terminal illnesses that incapacitate them. It is at this point that their demand for quality health care increases. If this trend persists, this phenomenon may remain a challenge in terms of resources and caregiving procedures (Marchese, 2012).
Perhaps, the most outstanding challenge for future health care management is that of providing sufficient human resources to provide services in the sector. Such professionals range from doctors, nurses, technicians, and support service providers. The cost of training health care professionals is high (Wolper, 2014). At the same time, not many individuals are willing to join the profession as other professions also present lucrative alternatives. To ensure efficient future provision of services in the health care sector, governme...