Evolving Practice of Nursing and Patient Care Delivery Models (Essay Sample)

Evolving Practice of Nursing and Patient Care Delivery Models Student’s Name Institution Affiliation Evolving Practice of Nursing and Patient Care Delivery Models With the U.S. seeking to restructure her healthcare care sector for the better, the role of professional nurses is likely to change rapidly, to have the nurses engage in a broad range of responsibilities. Today, as more and more healthcare organizations remain understaffed, taking care of patients becomes more intricate. This is further compounded by the endless chronic diseases like diabetes and high obesity rates that have engulfed the nation. This sector thus requires auspicious adjustments to aid in coping with some of the emerging challenges and reshuffles. In this case, the nurses have to be wary of the anticipated changes. The aim of this paper is to analyze the current trends in the nursing practice with the view of educating nurses on how the practice will grow and change. Educating Nurses about Changes in the Nursing Practice With the need for value-based services and quality care, nurses are presented with both opportunities and challenges. Educating them regarding the expected growth and changes in this sector is thus indispensable. Some of the areas that will witness healthcare transformation and change of nursing roles include the continuity of care, Accountable Care Organizations, medical homes, and nurse-managed healthcare clinics. Continuity or Continuum of Care Continuity of care or continuum of Care represents the association existing between a patient and a practitioner, which often goes beyond particular episodes of disease. This concept is vitally important in transforming the role of professional nurses. Its primary objective is to offer integrated healthcare services and high-quality treatment to service users. It also focusses on providing efficient care and low costs to the service users with chronic health issues (). The move to organize the sector of healthcare in the U.S. will essentially mean that continuity of care focusses on discharge planning for acute care from healthcare facilities to self-care. The primary goal for this will be to maintain a feasible approach to care between nursing staff and personalized care and thus redress the changing requirements of patients with severe illnesses. Three types of the continuum of care will come into play; relational continuity, informational continuity, and management continuity. Whereas relational continuity represents the continuous therapeutic relationship between the patient and his/her provider, informational continuity entails relying on information from past events and individual circumstances to present relevant care for clients (Zanello et al., 2015). On the other hand, management continuity is the cohesive and spontaneous approach to providing enhanced services to service users. Accountable Care Organizations (ACO) Accountable care organizations (ACO) will be an area of prime importance, especially for the American Nurses Association. The ACO essentially represent a group of healthcare providers like nurses and physicians tasked with ensuring quality healthcare to patients based on established performance standards (Chukmaitov, Harless, Bazzoli, Carretta, & Siangphoe, 2015). Nurses are obliged to stay updated on the continued collaboration of these providers in delivering smooth and continuous care for the clients. One of the statutes that have had a significant impact on healthcare delivery systems is the Affordable Care Act. The 2010 initiative essentially shifted the attention of healthcare service providers with the view of providing value-based healthcare. The ACOs are also likely to inspire organizational change by availing financial incentives to the service providers for taking part in value-based delivery of care. Medical Homes The use of medical homes has also been becoming popular, primarily providing day-to-day healthcare based on the patient's needs, values, and preferences. The concept of patient-centered medical home (PCMH) is used in describing the collaboration between patients, their families, and the primary care physician to ensure the patient accesses quality and culturally-sensitive care. The concept was developed as an extension of the Chronic Care Model with the view of redressing the incidence of chronic diseases in the U.S. through a team-based approach (). Nurses and advanced practice nurses (APNs) will assume an integral role in implementing this new U.S. healthcare model. Since its prominent inclusion in the 2010 Affordable Care Act, the concept has gained new significance. As the primary providers of preventive, chronic, and acute care, nurses should be knowledgeable about what a successful PCMH entails and what they are expected to do. The PCMH will help solve some of the high healthcare costs in its primary care preventive services (Fillmore, DuBard, Ritter, & Jackson, 2014). The effectiveness of nurses and the coordination in the team approach in this model is also expected to improve the provision of quality healthcare. Nurse-Managed Health Clinics With the view of making innovations that fundamentally transform primary care for the better, nurse-managed health clinics have also been embraced. These institutions are driven by a historical mission of treating the underserved populations in the U.S. Given that these centers are primarily operated by nurses as the primary providers, they could potentially reduce the need for primary care providers if they become more prevalent in future. Feedback from Nurse Colleagues The feedback from the three nurse colleagues shows that they are sensitive about the presentation on the potential growth and changes to be anticipated in the nursing practice in the United States. The nurse colleagues recognized the fact that change is inevitable and thus were ready to cope with the potential reorganizations the nursing practice is likely to witness. The U.S. healthcare sector is currently undergoing a rapid transformation seeking to deliver quality care and value-based services. To meet these goals, there is a need for the right mix of nurses with the ideal specialties, skills and competencies, practice setting, and the right locations. In regards to their commitment to ACO, for instance, the nurses fancy updating themselves regarding the cooperation with the disparate service providers in ensuring seamless delivery of health care services. With the professional nurses in the United States healthcare sector facing some of the biggest challenges in service delivery, the feedback from the nurse colleagues seemed supportive of eradicating some of the issues. Today, most of the healthcare institutions are still faced with the lack of sufficient professional nurses for providing enhanced healthcare services to those suffering from chronic illnesses (Nowrouzi et al., 2016). Additionally, the United States healthcare system is also facing challenges owing to the lack of sufficient partnerships among healthcare organizations. Based on the feedback given by the nurse colleagues, the continuum of care will be quite helpful in helping professional nurses facing some of these challenges. It will also aid in dealing with issues related to the acute demand for quality healthcare services, those associated with the service users, and any complexity emanating in the healthcare organizations. Continuity of care demands that nursing professionals related to home healthcare help service users by essentially helping service users to expand the continuum (Obioma, 2017). They can achieve this by visiting the service users in their residence and performing a health assessment on them in a bid to provide effective services. It may also incorporate other community-based services with the view of ensuring good health for the service users. The professional nurses also pointed out some of the integrated approaches employed towards ensuring that the anticipated growth and transformation in the nursing practice is effective for realizing the needs of patients. The nurses emphasized healthcare innovativeness like the use of health information systems (HIS), where nurses essentially use systems in collecting information from patients with the view of providing high-quality healthcare services at low costs. These systems are in line with the need for innovation in the U.S. health sector today, which aims at providing quality, affordable, and value-based care services. The information systems are essentially used in collecting information from service users regarding aspects of living like cultural practices, behavioral trends, environmental barriers, and their financial trajectory. The feedback from the nurses also touched on disease management mechanisms. They maintained that having disease management programs in place is vitally important in assessing the prevalence of some chronic illnesses like diabetes, obesity, cancer, cardiovascular diseases, and other alcohol-related issues. As a result, dealing with these diseases will be easier for healthcare professionals. In this case, relational continuity would play a significant role in ensuring clients are well attended to. Regarding the ACA, the nurse colleagues acknowledged that the statute will place demands on them as care providers and thus give them the opportunity to deliver more patient-centered care for clients. With the system primarily focusing on changing the attention of U.S. healthcare delivery from acute care to value-based care, th...