The Quadruple Aim provides broad categories of goals to pursue to maintain and improve healthcare. Within each goal are many issues that, if addressed successfully, may have a positive impact on outcomes. For example, healthcare leaders are being tasked to shift from an emphasis on disease management often provided in an acute care setting to health promotion and disease prevention delivered in primary care settings. Efforts in this area can have significant positive impacts by reducing the need for primary healthcare and by reducing the stress on the healthcare system.

Changes in the industry only serve to stress what has always been true; namely, that the healthcare field has always faced significant challenges, and that goals to improve healthcare will always involve multiple stakeholders. This should not seem surprising given the circumstances. Indeed, when a growing population needs care, there are factors involved such as the demands of providing that care and the rising costs associated with healthcare. Generally, it is not surprising that the field of healthcare is an industry facing multifaceted issues that evolve over time.

In this module’s Discussion, you reviewed some healthcare issues/stressors and selected one for further review. For this Assignment, you will consider in more detail the healthcare issue/stressor you selected. You will also review research that addresses the issue/stressor and write a white paper to your organization’s leadership that addresses the issue/stressor you selected.

To Prepare:

• Review the national healthcare issues/stressors presented in the Resources and reflect on the national healthcare issue/stressor you selected for study.
• Reflect on the feedback you received from your colleagues on your Discussion post for the national healthcare issue/stressor you selected.
• Identify and review two additional scholarly resources (not included in the Resources for this module) that focus on change strategies implemented by healthcare organizations to address your selected national healthcare issue/stressor.

The Assignment (4 Pages):

Analysis of a Pertinent Healthcare Issue

Develop 4-page paper, written to your organization’s leadership team, addressing your selected national healthcare issue/stressor and how it is impacting your work setting. Be sure to address the following:

• Describe the national healthcare issue/stressor you selected and its impact on your organization. Use organizational data to quantify the impact (if necessary, seek assistance from leadership or appropriate stakeholders in your organization).
• Provide a brief summary of the two articles you reviewed from outside resources on the national healthcare issue/stressor. Explain how the healthcare issue/stressor is being addressed in other organizations.
• Summarize the strategies used to address the organizational impact of national healthcare issues/stressors presented in the scholarly resources you selected. Explain how they may impact your organization both positively and negatively. Be specific and provide examples.

Looking Ahead

The paper you develop in Module 1 will be revisited and revised in Module 2. Review the Assignment instructions for Module 2 to prepare for your revised paper.

HEALTHCARE ISSUES 4

Cost of healthcare

Name of student

Name of institution

Date

Introduction

Healthcare issues are far and wide with reaching effects not only to the patients but also the healthcare practitioners. Most of these issues are complex and that is why they are yet to be solved. This paper examines one such issue, the cost of healthcare in the US.

Cost of healthcare

It is no secret that America has the highest healthcare system in the world. The people are severely burdened by this economic cost. This is made more apparent by the large numbers of people who cannot afford health and dental insurance (Rovner, 2019). They are thus left vulnerable in case of an emergency medical situation.

This presents a challenge in the work place as many patients come in seeking treatment and cannot afford the essential services they need. The hospital has been forced in some cases to turn back some people as it cannot afford to be giving out free services. Some families have been severely impacted and have had to sell off most of their belongings to offset the huge medical bills they have accrued over the course of their treatments. According to Dresden, the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act was expected to reduce emergency department visits when passed, rather emergency department visits increased by 5.7% which could be associated to an increase in patient’s coverage with but lack of access to quality healthcare. (Dresden et al, 2016).

The healthcare system is aware of the problem. It has responded by lowering the cost of insurance to the people. This has aided the homeless and the disadvantaged in the community as they are eligible to Medicaid for free. There has also been an increased funding of hospitals by the government to reduce their costs.

Our health care facility has also been proactive in the issue. The medical staff is allowed to attend to people with dire conditions even if they do not have the money to pay for it. This includes people who have had accidents and terminally ill patients.

Conclusion

The high cost of healthcare in America is a significant issue. More should be done to address it. A shift to universal healthcare is desirable.

References

Rovner, J. (2019). The complicated, political, expensive, seemingly eternal US healthcare debate explained. BMJ, 367.

Dresden, S., Powell, E., Kang, R., Mchugh, M… & Feinglass, J. (2016). Increased emergency department use in Illinois after implementation of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act. Annals of Emergency Medicine, 2(69), 172-189. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.annemergmed.2016.06.026

Required Readings

Broome, M., & Marshall, E. S. (2021). Transformational leadership in nursing: From expert clinician to influential leader (3rd ed.). New York, NY: Springer.

· Chapter 2, “Transformational Leadership: Complexity, Change, and Strategic Planning” (pp. 34–62)

· Chapter 3, “Current Challenges in Complex Health Care Organizations and the Quadruple Aim” (pp. 66–97)

Read any TWO of the following (plus TWO additional readings on your selected issue):

Auerbach, D. I., Staiger, D. O., & Buerhaus, P. I. (2018). Growing ranks of advanced practice clinicians—Implications for the physician workforce. New England Journal of Medicine, 378(25), 2358–2360. doi:10.1056/NEJMp1801869

Gerardi, T., Farmer, P., & Hoffman, B. (2018). Moving closer to the 2020 BSN-prepared workforce goal. American Journal of Nursing, 118(2), 43–45.

Jacobs, B., McGovern, J., Heinmiller, J., & Drenkard, K. (2018). Engaging employees in well-being: Moving from the Triple Aim to the Quadruple Aim. Nursing Administration Quarterly, 42(3), 231–245.

Norful, A. A., de Jacq, K., Carlino, R., & Poghosyan, L. (2018). Nurse practitioner–physician comanagement: A theoretical model to alleviate primary care strain. Annals of Family Medicine, 16(3), 250–256.

Palumbo, M., Rambur, B., & Hart, V. (2017). Is health care payment reform impacting nurses’ work settings, roles, and education preparation? Journal of Professional Nursing, 33(6), 400–404.

Park, B., Gold, S. B., Bazemore, A., & Liaw, W. (2018). How evolving United States payment models influence primary care and its impact on the Quadruple Aim. Journal of the American Board of Family Medicine, 31(4), 588–604.

Pittman, P., & Scully-Russ, E. (2016). Workforce planning and development in times of delivery system transformation. Human Resources for Health, 14(56), 1–15. doi:10.1186/s12960-016-0154-3. Retrieved from

https://human-resources-health.biomedcentral.com/track/pdf/10.1186/s12960-016-0154-3 

Poghosyan, L., Norful, A., & Laugesen, M. (2018). Removing restrictions on nurse practitioners’ scope of practice in New York state: Physicians’ and nurse practitioners’ perspectives. Journal of the American Association of Nurse Practitioners, 30(6), 354–360.

Ricketts, T., & Fraher, E. (2013). Reconfiguring health workforce policy so that education, training, and actual delivery of care are closely connected. Health Affairs, 32(11), 1874–1880.

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