Cost-Cutting In American Health Nursing Assignment (Essay Sample)

Cost-Cutting in American Health
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Cost-Cutting in American Health
While the cost of healthcare continues to rise in America with each passing day, there are many facets about the benefit of this approach. Patients on the one side complain of the cost plummeted by insurance firms, researchers and the doctors alike, view wellness as the ultimate remedy for the rising cost of health in America. One thing that stands out is the increase in medical health technologies which in some degree lead to the cost-cutting discussions that have risen in the recent past. Nonetheless, this analytical paper will address some of these issues by basing on some case issues presented from different dimensions of the topic of cost cutting in health.
1 Slow Medicine
The discourses on ‘slow medicine’ have captured the very foundations of medicine in varied ways. One very striking issue about ‘slow medicine’ is that doctors will be in a better position to diagnose a patient and locate the best care for them by basically looking at their lifestyle and remedies that modern medicine technology may surpass. According to Dr. Victoria Sweet, the need for efficiency in and control of healthcare costs has resulted in numerous errors in the path of preventive care. Doctors now focus on cures rather than on prevention and this is the very reason why medical costs have been on the rise. Slow medicine will lead satisfying treatment and the medical costs will drop tremendously.
The current discussion demonstrates that Doctor Sweet’s assertions can be the only way that America will find the lasting solution to medical costs. Although ‘slow medicine’ may not be appropriate to emergency room health, it is the best way to handling cost related to chronic illnesses such as diabetes, cancer, high blood pressure and even heart disease. Dealing with the wholesome treatment in such cases will not only lead to lasting treatment to the patient but at the same time, the cost of depending on machines to survive will generally drop. American health needs a paradigm shift in the way physicians approach to care so that the rising number of deaths and medical bills can go down. Take, for instance, a cancer patient who finds it better to connect with his physician on a daily basis on ways to control their health and a Diabetic patient who is constantly being placed on drugs instead of being directed on better ways of managing their diets. One fine margin with slow medicine is that healing can start right before a disease is spotted and this can be the difference between efficiency and proper reduced cost in health and treatment (Radcliffe, 2015).
2 Insurance and Cost of Care
A patient who finds time to talk to a surgeon about his occupation and family background minutes before surgery may be afraid of two things. First, they are mostly frightened by the increasing cost of care which in this case, has led to another patient in room 403, to remain in the hospital for long because they can afford the care through their employer-supported insurance schemes and Smith cannot afford. Second, they are afraid of dying through the lengthy use of machines in the hospital. Third, some cardiac patients tend to be tough because they feel they may render their family members dependent when they pass away because they will be paying medical bills increased by paying large insurance claims.
The role of insurance companies in American health has become a challenge over time. For people without basic salaries, the challenge of maintaining huge premiums to cater for their health, in future, is quite impossible. They jump from one project to another and these projects have varying low paying capacities meaning sustaining a regular income to pay for insurance premiums is just about hearsay than a practicality. It is possible Mr. Smith was telling the surgeon to do the surgery in a safer way so that he does not have to pay huge claims in case of any unforeseen costs due to his length of stay in the recovery room and the ward. Insurance companies take advantage of such issues to increase the cost of care pegged on private premium payers such as Smith.
3 Six Sigma
Operational efficiencies seem to override the need for affordable care to many Americans. While doctors may focus on providing quality care there are reports that America accounts for the highest number of deaths due to medical errors which can be avoided (Jones, 2014). True Quality Improvement is possible when health care providers are honest with one another and the patients. The Six Sigma process locates these defects in the system and helps to rectify them. But in the healthcare errors when these errors lead to deaths and other issues related to patient care there is a need for the health provider to be honest with the patient and their colleagues so that the errors can be identified and sorted in time. For instance, when nurses administer wrong medications, there is a need for them to report such issues to other departments such as the pharmacy section so that the error can be identified in time before reaching the patient and causing them harm.
When leveraging Six Sigma, total honesty is necessary because with these information individuals involved in the system can aid the person reporting to know what defects are in the system. Trust in the new designs being developed is critical because that is also the only way that commitment will be developed by those in the organization. When management announces the introduction of Six Sigma plan in the hospital workers develop stress and fear of unknown (Perteka, 2013). In this dimension, it is important that they remain honest to what they are communicating so that they can be collaboration. In addition, having physicians and nurses that have integrity in their reporting solving mistakes that cause serious pain and death can be easier. The goal of Six Sigma is to have 3.4 defects in a million opportunities and this can be a challenge if the professional health providers do not report with honesty (Bertels, Williams, and Dershin, 2017). It would remain as a cycle of errors which cannot be rectified in time and the hospital may suffer in the long run because of lack of honesty.
4 Transition from Hand-Written Medical Records to EMR
The complaints about transition from old to...