Not everyone is receptive to change. Hence, implementing my suggested change in my clinical practice will require the support of different stakeholders in the healthcare system. I am particularly determined to change poor decision making in my practice. I have witnessed poor clinical decision making within a department based upon a lack of clinical and leadership skills. I, therefore, would want to make it mandatory for all nurses who are to be promoted to leadership positions to undertake a leadership course to be able to make good clinical judgments. I also want my practice to make it mandatory for all nurses to undergo a six-month mentorship program. To implement these changes, I would have to convince the organization’s administrators, supervisors, the CEO as well as the other nurses on the importance of implementing change. To do so, I would conduct a study in my practice to identify some of the challenges I have encountered in the practice such as inadequate staffing, lack of morale, mismanagement of medical supply and equipment as well as lack of interdisciplinary collaboration. I would then use the evidence I obtained from the research to call for change.
I would present data that show glaring weaknesses in the current leadership. I believe that effective leadership is an important component of any healthcare system and has a critical role to play in the improvement of organizational efficiency and effectiveness (Ghiasipour et al., 2017). Hence, when there is no morale among the nurses, it is obvious that something must be a miss in the leadership. Some of the obvious indicators of lack of morale among nurses are frequent complaints from patients, increased medical mistakes such as misdiagnosis or mixing up patient’s medicine. These cases are rampant in my practice. I would gather data indicating the number of medical mistakes made in the past six months to support my call or a change in leadership and mandatory training and mentorship for future leaders. Moreover, I would also collect data on mismanagement of medical supply and equipment. Even though the hospital makes yearly budgetary allocations for essential medical equipment, the hospital has substandard machines. It, therefore, goes without saying that funds meant for important medical equipment are being mismanaged by the hospital’s leadership. This data also supports my call for a change in leadership.
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Each of the stakeholders will be presented by information from credible sources supporting the need for change. For instance, the organization’s administrators will be presented with information on clinical practice efficiency. A study conducted by Rao (2002) established that improving patient care should be a priority of every healthcare institution with the primary objective of enhancing patient satisfaction. What is more, competition in the healthcare practice, the rise in medical malpractice litigations, an increase in regulations and increased awareness and demand for better care justify the implementation of change. The administrators should know that implementing change is of benefit to the practice both now and in the future (Rao, 2002). Moreover, given the high cost of medical malpractice litigation, we should implement changes that will eliminate malpractices and cushion the healthcare institution against unnecessary costs. In the same breath, my fellow nurses should be informed about their role in the change process. For this reason, I will provide them with literature that speaks about physicians' experiences of changing clinical practice. In particular, Gupta, Boland and Aaron’s study highlights the importance of nurses taking the front seat in the change process (Gupta, Boland, & Aaron, 2017). Lastly, patients and their families will only be informed about the suggested changes and how they will improve the patient experience.
To evaluate my proposed intervention and validate its effectiveness, I would write down a plan that will include the advantages and disadvantages of implementing my interventions. I would also provide a real-life example of where the intervention was used and the benefits that were realized. In this regard, I plan on identifying at least three healthcare institutions within our locality that have successfully changed their approach towards leadership and the benefits they have realized from the change process. What is more, I will look for evidence-based studies that support the change process in clinical settings.
Undoubtedly, the health institution’s administration must test my proposed improvements in leadership before they adopt my entire leadership approach. Hence, the hospital should use one department to test my theory. The surgery department will be placed under new nursing supervisors for a period of six months. The new leaders must have undergone leadership training. The previous leaders will deputize the new leaders so they can learn how to lead effectively and efficiently. The administration will then observe the changes realized from the change in leadership over the six-month duration. The new leaders should be able to boost the nurses’ morale, to enhance interdisciplinary collaboration, to ensure the surgery department has enough staff and to eliminate mismanagement of medical supply and equipment in the department. If they manage to affect these changes within six months, the administration should be ready and willing to accept and implement my suggested intervention. Contrastingly, if the new leaders fail in their mandate, the hospital’s administration should either extend the period of the test or look for another alternative. It bears noting that the change process in clinical settings is not an easy one. It requires the will and dedication of the major stakeholders for change to take root.
References
Ghiasipour, M., Mosadeghrad, A. M., Arab, M., & Jaafaripooyan, E. (2017). Leadership challenges in health care organizations: The case of Iranian hospitals. Medical Journal of the Islamic Republic of Iran, 31 (96), 2-7. doi:10.14196/mjiri.31.96
Gupta, D. M., Boland, R. J., & Aaron, D. C. (2017). The physician’s experience of changing clinical practice: a struggle to unlearn. Implementation Science . Retrieved from https://implementationscience.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s13012-017-0555-2
Rao, G. N. (2002). How can we improve patient care? Community Health Eye Journal, 15 (41), 1-3. Retrieved from https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1705904/
