One of the emerging issues in healthcare projects is the involvement of stakeholders at all stages; these stages include the selection of the project, research, funding, designing, and implementation. A stakeholder is defined as any party with vested interests in a particular healthcare project or evidence that informs the project (National Center for Biotechnology Information, n.d). In mental illness projects, there are many stakeholders, both internal and external. Internal stakeholders include clinicians, therapists, and administrators of health centers. External stakeholders include patients, patient advocacy groups, caregivers, public and private insurers, policymakers at all level s of government, government agencies, professional bodies, and researchers. Though it might be challenging to engage all stakeholders due to limitations of time and budget, seeking stakeholders’ support is necessary for the success of healthcare projects.
In any project, the stakeholders have different interests. For example, patient’s advocacy groups may not have the same interests as healthcare insurance providers. This means that there will be a need to balance the views of the different groups before implementing the project. One of the benefits of engaging all stakeholders is getting different points of view on the project. If one trusts their own knowledge or consults only a few groups of stakeholders, there’s a risk of ignoring essential interests of another group. For example, in a discussion over the use of technology in healthcare at the Center for Medical Technology Policy 2009, different groups were asked to present their views (Hoffman, Montgomery, Aubry, & Tunis, 2010) . What int erested patients most was the complexity of the clinical materials while medical academics were most concerned with the usefulness of the technology (Hoffman et al., 2010). Both groups agreed that cost was an important consideration (Hoffman et al., 2010). As seen, seeking the support of different stakeholders helps one make an informed decision when setting the project’s priorities. Also, stakeholder engagement helps the project get input in the form of funding and research from them. Finally, stakeholder engagement minimizes conflicts between different stakeholders (Leviton & Melichar, n.d.).
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There are different ways of engaging stakeholders and getting their support. The first step is contacting the stakeholders informing them of their role in the project and inviting them to give their views of matters that affect them. One of the most effective methods of stakeholder engagement is data collection through methods like structured interviews.
References
Hoffman, A., Montgomery, R., Aubry, W., & Tunis, S. R. (2010, October). How Best To Engage Patients, Doctors, And Other Stakeholders In Designing Comparative Effectiveness Studies. Retrieved August 12, 2019, from Health Affairs Organization: https://www.healthaffairs.org/doi/full/10.1377/hlthaff.2010.0675
Leviton, L. C., & Melichar, L. (n.d.). Balancing stakeholder needs in the evaluation of healthcare quality improvement. Retrieved August 12, 2019, from The British Journal of Medicine: https://qualitysafety.bmj.com/content/25/10/803
National Center for Biotechnology Information. (n.d.). Defining the Benefits of Stakeholder Engagement in Systematic Reviews. Retrieved August 12, 2019, from https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK196176/
