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Introduction: Issues in the healthcare sector
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Headland Business Park is a commercial destination present at Moorchydore Road, Australia. The business park gives a strong financial impetus to the area and emanates a strong vision to grow the business. The tenants of the Headland Business Park mostly belong to the healthcare sector.
Health sector management is a significant factor in the modern world. The term denotes the process of management that involves health facilities. Management involves providing leadership in the hospital arena, in the network of hospitals, and general administration of the health facility. It is said that healthcare management is one of the most significant services being provided to the population. With proper management, the health care service will be able to motivate all the workers within the sector, which in turn will reap better medical service facilities for the public.
In this detailed task, the analysis will be done of certain tenants of healthcare and emphasis must be given to identifying certain issues they possess. Such issues will be discussed and recommendations will also be provided. The healthcare tenants which will be analysed here are as follows, the Sunshine Coast Radiology, Avenue Dental, ICON Cancer Centre, Maroochy Eye Specialists, and Bear In Mind Psychology (Wager, Lee, and Glaser, 2021).
1. Case Background:
Sunshine Coast Radiology is a healthcare sector providing quite a lot of services to the patients like cardiac imaging for investigating heart problems, management of pain through precise assessment and guidance to relief such, as ultrasound services to understand certain body issues, and service of bone densitometry. The other services provided by them are, MRI, CT scan, X-ray, dental imaging to understand any underlying dental problems, and women's imaging to resolve the raging problem of breast cancer. Sunshine Coast Radiology provides high-quality imaging of the body through its highly professional and skilled technicians (Hosny et al., 2018).
Avenue Dental is a conglomerate of dental care centers across the region and one is present at Maroochydore road. This dental center consists of highly skilled and trained dentists who have been providing dental services to their customers. The dental center has a wide range of dental examinations and services, for instance, dental implants, filling and crowns to the implants, and also cosmetic dentistry. They provide their customers with a warranty for major dental operations, the centre also provides emergency dental services. The centre promises to provide the best dental care under a budget, and their opening hours are quite extended (Teoh et al., 2019).
ICON Cancer Centre, their website says that they provide private cancer care and treatment to their patients. The centre has thirty-five years of experience behind them and their oncology doctors are all skilled and professional. The centre provides services like chemotherapy, radiation, and therapy for blood disorders and many more. They also promise to stay by their patient's side throughout the treatment process, both the doctors and the passionate staff (Cormie et al., 2018).
Maroochy Eye Specialist is a qualified eye care centre that was opened in the year 2020. The centre has highly skilled doctors who are dedicated to serving their patients with quality facilities and care. The centre provides comprehensive eye treatment for cataracts, glaucoma, pterygium, and many more to all its patients. Treatments are done through detailed eye exams, using professional methods. Other services like eye laser treatments and minor operational procedures are done here as well.
Bear In Mind Psychology is a healthcare facility providing services to all adults, teenagers, and children alike. This centre provides therapy and makes its patients achieve goals through it. The centre promises to provide a supportive environment to its patients. They provide services like counselling, learning assessment, and intervention, and all the staff there are highly qualified.
2. Integrated and Value-Based Health Care:
Healthcare is a conglomeration of activities and services provided to patients and customers by an organised sector of professionals and skilled staff. They provide this service to the population to diagnose, treat, and prevent the spread of any disease and also to cure it. Healthcare facilities are a joint venture of professionals and allied healthcare sectors, and together they serve society. Integrated healthcare is a process or an approach through which professional healthcare providers and staff collaborate and communicate with each other to provide an overall quality of services. Integrated health care is necessary because it provides the patients and the health systems with high-quality health plans, programs, and groomings. Integrated healthcare also provides innovations and creative approaches to solve issues in the health sector. Integrated care is also known as coordinated and seamless care.
According to Deschodt et al., (2020), integrated healthcare has several, different models, for instance, individual models, group and disease-centric models, and ultimately population-based models. The first category of the model, that is the individual model, emphasises high-risk patients and requires intensive care with individual coordination. This model focuses to stop or minimise the divisions of services between the healthcare providers. However, the study shows that the individual integration models are practised sometimes differently, as the situation demands. This model also allows the patient to control the budget of the treatment which benefits them to understand the condition more clearly. It increases the satisfaction of the patient, however, the critical situation of the patients might sometimes stress them to manage budgets properly.
Group and disease-specific models of integrated healthcare have the chronic care model, which is widely accepted and famous. This model is designed for mapping the procedures and comprehensive functions of the healthcare sector to provide care for a group of patients with chronic illnesses (Yeoh et al., 2018). This model emphasises improving the conditions of the patients and also cost management. There is another model which focuses on providing intensive services to the group of elderly and frail patients (Deschodt et al.,2020). The disease-centric model focuses on providing better integration of care to patients with specific long-term diseases like diabetes and hypertension.
Lastly in the integrated model, is the population-centric model, which emphasises the division of the population according to their medical needs. The population is fragmented and the medical needs of those fragmented parts of the population are catered to.
According to the study by Deschodt et al., (2020), Value-based care is also an integral part of healthcare services. This care system provides patients with intensive care, and the costs of treatment get lower as well. It reduces the chances of medical mishaps or errors, and also the patients are better informed about their condition and progress. Value-based health care model enables the service providers, for instance, the doctors, the nurses, the pathologists, and others to get their payment according to the health results of their patients.
3. Identification of the issues
The result of the new economy has been enabled by rising technology, the market environment has shifted, affecting businesses across the board. It is no surprise that cutting-edge technologies like AI and machine learning are fueling hospital-use software like "Appointment Management Systems", "Patient Administration Systems", and "Laboratory Information Management Systems". However, most healthcare providers such as Sunshine Coast radiology, and even industry leaders, lack the sophisticated planning and data administration organizations necessary to effectively handle data from a variety of sources (Ginter et al., 2018). The issue is that the organization is using relational databases, which are ill-equipped to handle effectively the massive amounts of unstructured data that may be generated by gathering information from a variety of different sources. Organizations in the healthcare industry must develop operational, tactical, and strategic models of management to support combined health organizations, and they must also form partnerships with reputable integrators who have developed service management processes.
Avenue Dental also faces difficulties while trying to maximize income. Most businesses in the dental sector considered expanding their income and customer base to be of paramount importance (Kumari et al., 2018). However, many dentists worry that getting more patients would result in less face time with their patients, even though this will enhance the income side of the margin equation. Several dental practice executives feel that the increasing focus on high volume and poor margins is forcing them to hurry patients through visits and limit their treatment choices.
Lack of infrastructure is one of the issues that is faced by the Icon Cancer Centre. Due to a lack of infrastructure, the corporation faces failure in diagnosing and treatment of patients. This leads to a decline in sales and profitability for the organization (Tariq et al., 2020). On the other hand, the decrease in the profitability of the business also leads to issues for the organization in meeting its presence in the Headland Business Park.
Lack of continuous education to health workers on eye health is one of the issues that are faced by Maroochy Eye Specialists. Lack of education among workers leads to several problems such as appropriate treatment of patients and children. This leads to dissatisfaction among clients and customers. The specialists involved in Maroochy Eye Specialist lack knowledge and experience in their relevant field due to which there is delay and inappropriateness in treatment and diagnosis (Britnell, 2019). The organization has been established in 2020, therefore the corporation is facing difficulties in establishing its business on an efficient basis in the business park.
Gathering required financial resources is one of the challenges that is faced by Bear in Mind psychology. The organization consists of a small group of education and developmental psychologists (Hathaliya and Tanwar, 2020). Due to a small group of individuals, the organization has been facing difficulties in influencing its brand in the healthcare sector. Shortage of finances also leads to a lack of psychological equipment and specialists in the organization. This leads to failure for the organization in gathering a patient base in the relevant region.
4. Analysis of the problem
Weak and poor technology not only fails the diagnosis and treatment of patients in Sunshine Coast radiology but also slows down the operational activities and processes of the organization. Processing of invoices and patient bills, and record keeping of staff and patients also fall under technological aspects which are negatively impacted due to the shortage of technologies in the organization (Ali et al., 2018). Due to the issues of technologies the corporation is unable to access and analyze the records of patients and diagnosis processes that are performed in the corporation. With poor technology infrastructure, the corporation is unable to connect with patients on a remote basis.
Maximizing revenues is one of the problems that are faced by dental specialists. The specialist considers that an increase in the number of patients may result in a decline in the proper face-to-face interaction of patients. This results in improper treatment of the patients which decreases revenues. A strategic process is one of the ways of mitigating the issues (Chen and Decary, 2020). The dental specialist should establish competencies and skills and identify responsibilities to mitigate the issues of maximizing the revenues of Avenue Dental.
The infrastructure issue of Icon Cancer Centre may result in a decline in gaining a competitive advantage in the healthcare sector. The organization needs to implement rival positioning to identify the process and operations of the competitors and based on the rival's activities the corporation can implement different infrastructures that will allow it to gain a competitive advantage. Internal analysis is one of the frameworks that will enable the organization to identify its strengths and weaknesses (Rushton, 2018). By identifying the strength and weaknesses the organization will be able to implement a strategic process.
Shortage of education among health workers results in incorrect diagnoses and treatment of the patients. This leads to disruption of the reputation of the brand among the clients and customers. Poor knowledge among healthcare workers also leads to severe problems and issues among patients. With these criteria, Maroochy Eye Specialists may face low sales and profitability of their business.
Bear in Mind Psychology faces issues in gathering financial resources to diagnose and treat patients. Unable to gather the required financial resources may impact the operational process of the organization. Limited financial resources also lead to incorrect infrastructure (Lustgarten et al., 2020). Technologies, equipment, and administration are some of the areas that are affected by the issues of finance in the organization. The organization needs to identify certain strategies to deal with the issue as the problem is a serious concern for Bear in Mind Psychology. On the other hand, the emergence of the issue also leads to failure in implementing psychology specialists with expertise and skills. Increasing the level of finances in the organization will result in positive impacts such as an increase in sales and revenues, proper operational processes, and an upsurge in the sales and revenue of the organization. Accelerating the level of finances also helps the organization to implement marketing strategies that will allow the organization to gather a customer base and build a presence in the healthcare sector.
5. Alternative solutions
Implementing health information technology is one of the alternative solutions that can be used by Sunshine Coast Radiology. Health information technology (IT) benefits include enhancing communication between medical professionals, optimizing the availability of clinical guidelines, and enhancing the safety, monitoring, and reporting of medications. With the use of health information technology, the organization will be able to track and analyze patients' records (Rushton, 2018). The technology will also help the organization in enhancing communication among employees and patients which leads to better results and outputs.
Collaboration with other healthcare organizations is one of the alternative solutions that will allow Avenue Dental to maximize its profits with an increase in the volume of patients. Collaboration allows the corporation to share the threats and financial losses with one another. This helps in mitigating monetary issues in the organization. On the other hand, with collaboration, the corporation will be able to access different technologies and strategies that may result in positive results for Avenue Dental.
Joint ownership is one of the ways through which the Icon Cancer Centre will be able to improve its infrastructure to gain a competitive advantage in the market. Joint ownership provides effective and efficient policies and leadership ideas for the decision-making process (Britnell, 2019). This will allow the organization to improve its infrastructural development in the healthcare industry. Joint ownership will result in shared responsibility and innovative ideas and strategies for developing infrastructure.
Maroochy Eye Specialists needs to provide training sessions and programs to its healthcare workers. This is one of the solutions that will help in increasing the knowledge of workers in the diagnosis and treatment of patients. Training on diagnosis and treatment and training on handling technological requirements are some of the training that needs to be implemented for the workers and employees of the organization. On the other hand, weekly assessment needs to be provided to the employees to analyze and monitor their knowledge of the organization.
Gathering support from a non-profit organization is one of the solutions that will help Bear in Mind Psychology mitigate the issues of financial stress. This will also allow the organization to improve its treatment and diagnosis process which will create a sense of satisfaction among the patients and clients (Tariq et al., 2020). Experienced and skilled employees need to be recruited to enhance the offering of services to the patients. This will help the organization to provide relevant services with minimum resources. Offering quality services with minimum resources will allow the organization to create satisfaction among the clients. Satisfaction among the clients will increase the sales and revenue of the organization. With the increase in sales and revenues, the organization will be able to mitigate the issues of finances in the organization. Connecting with the non-profit organization may allow Bear in Mind Psychology to gather additional assistance such as expanding the presence of the corporation in different regions and areas. This is one of the added advantages that can be gathered through connecting with non-profit organizations.
Conclusion:
The essay here emphasised thoroughly about health care management and all the factors related to it. Existing theories have been analysed here and based on the various issues are identified. The issues are also clearly addressed here. Various health centres were taken into account and their issues are discussed aligning with the strategy and healthcare policy. A detailed analysis has been made of integrated and value-based health care. Various models are also mentioned here with their systematic explanations to establish literature. Problems have been identified with the tenants of Headland Business Park. A critical problem analysis has also been made, with a detailed alternative solution.
Recommendations:
The lack of technology in the healthcare sector can lead to severe issues. In this modern globalised world, technology and artificial intelligence are the significant contributors that regulate our daily life. The healthcare sectors are no exception. The usage of technology has benefited the healthcare sector in various ways. However, it can be seen that technological issues are present in this sector. There are certain recommendations as follows which might solve the issues. Data management in health care sectors is a necessity as well, with the help of technology. Huge amounts of data in the healthcare sectors can be handled with programs like artificial intelligence, Apache Spark, Data Lakes, and many more which are equipped to handle the pool of data (Cresswell and Sheikh, 2015).
To generate greater revenue from the clinics, the rate of case acceptance must be high. Studies show that if the case acceptance rate is kept around sixty to seventy percent then the clinics can increase their revenue generation. However, this recommendation can only be fulfilled by the support of a team of care providers who will not compromise the face time with their patients.
Health infrastructure can be improved via certain recommendations emphasised here. For instance, by increasing the study of health education. If one is aware of their rights through education, then the infrastructure will also be benefited. It can also be achieved by decentralising public health care services. Emphasis must be made, decentralise the best hospitals in the urban area, and spreading the facilities in the inaccessible areas as well.
Lack of proper education among workers and healthcare providers can generate customer dissatisfaction. A recommendation to solve this issue will be to provide the workers and the staff with detailed mentoring sessions before they enter into the healthcare sector. Proper mentoring might benefit to create of a set of care providers who will be equipped with their services (Dehghani, Nasiriani and Salimi, 2016).
The issue of gathering financial resources by a healthcare centre can be solved with complete knowledge and understanding of the performance of the revenue cycle. By understanding the cycle, the organisation can identify its issues and try to solve them. Revenue cycle analytics can also be used to gather financial resources from within the sector.
References
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