Strategic Decision Making In Healthcare

Responsibilities of Healthcare Managers 

Healthcare managers have the responsibilities of ensuring a health and safety environment for the workers and patients. The study shows that most health workers approached their managers with safety issues (Shanks, 2016) . Health manager should then be informed and come up with strategies that increase safety in the workplaces. It is important that health and safety within the healthcare environment is adequately budgeted for compliance. Managers also have the responsibility to take part in training that makes them understand their responsibilities in preventing litigations (Shanks, 2016) . A manager is mandated to supervisors and instructs other health works and it is their responsibility to do so, so as to reduce litigation and maintain compliance. Some of the responsibilities of a health manager include; 

Providing enough time and resources to Support Departmental Health and Safety Officers (DHSO) 

Implementing health and safety strategies that are relevant to the healthcare facility and departments 

Ensuring attendance of the worker in safety and health training 

Ensuring proper emergency measures are in place for all the department 

Facilitate effective documentation of patient information 

participate in health and safety inspections 

Strategies to Minimize Liability 

Health works need to adopt strategies that provide quality care to their patients. These strategies include; 

Effective communication 

Effective communication among the health worker must be the fundamental approach to providing quality care (Yang & Silverman, 2014) . Health works must have open and honest communications in caring for their Patients. The study showed that honest information has reduced the number of malpractice in healthcare organizations. It is important to also have better-listening skills among the health providers to reduce malpractice in the workplaces. Effective communication between health provider and their patients is also important and it can be facilitated by the use of a simple language. 

Training 

Doctors should keep their knowledge and specialization up to date through training. This helps the doctors to be aware of new developments in technology and disease management. Through this, the health care providers become effective in providing quality care. 

Documentation 

Health works should be accurate in taking down the correct information about a patient to ensure the right care has been provided. Many healthcare facilities today use the electronic method to file patients' information, but hard copy backup information is also important in avoiding malpractice (Yang et al., 2014) . It is also important to provide information to patients on the procedure to be taken and the risk associated with it. 

Follow-ups 

Failing to have Follow-up strategies in healthcare organization has also led to poor care services. Sometimes patients fail to follow instructions provided by their doctors (Yang et al., 2014) . As a result, it is important for doctors and other health staff to follow-up on the status of their patients to ensure that all instructions are followed. 

Litigation Risks 

Violence Occurrences 

Health centers have seen an increase in a number of violent incidents over time. These incidents have put both patients and medical experts at the risk of harassment, intimidation, and attacks . Research has shown that the rate of violence in the health sector was greater than that of private industries in 2012 (Durand, Moulton, Cockle, Mann, & Elwyn, 2015) . The most common violence in the healthcare facilities is rape and homicides. The healthcare must have policies and strategies to avoid any form of violence either verbal or physical. For instance, offenders can be subjected to the disciplinary action, including dismissal. 

Telemedicine 

Many of healthcare facilities have increased the use of telemedicine in treating patients due to; the advancement of technology, increased number of patients needing affordable care and the shortage of healthcare providers (Durand et al., 2015) . The use of telemedicine can lead to poor quality health care services in organizations where the healthcare providers do not have, experience and the proper training. Telemedicine has no state standard of medical rules currently. 

Environmental Pollution 

The advancement in medical technology has led to the construction of new facilities and expanding existing one. This construction of new facilities has led to a wide diversity of environmental pollution including air and water pollutions (Durand et al., 2015) . These pollutions pose a life-threatening response to patients who have weak immune systems. Construction projects cause the spread of bacteria and viruses through cooling, drying, heating and water systems. 

Alarm fatigue 

Alarms are designed to alert the health works about the possible problem but most of them may fail to respond to the alarms. Alarm fatigue is an increasing problem in health care center and these have caused problems. A study has shown that 98 alarm-related problems were identified in 2009 to 2012. Out of the 98 events, 80 led to death, five lead to additional care while 13 of them lead to loss of function (Durand et al., 2015) . To reduce such incidents strategies for safe alarm management should be implemented. 

Clinical and Administrative Problems 

Financial problems and hospital efficiency 

Healthcare costs have increased due to intensive use of energy to run the facilities. These financial problems have made healthcare organizations provide poor services to their patients (Boswell, Kraus, Miller, & Lambert, 2015) . Healthcare organizations can combat these problems through strategizing the energy consumption. Installation of meters and sensors can be done for the collection of energy information from various areas in the organization. 

Hospital insecurity 

Most of the Healthcare facilities are open 24/7. This has led to crimes such as; infant kidnappings, Violence, theft of drugs and facility properties (Boswell et al., 2015) . These problems can be addressed by putting in place integrated security system with tracking location systems. For instance, if assets have been stolen, the security system will alert the management. 

Patient satisfaction 

Research shows that patients are cleared on an average of 2.5 days early from green hospital compared to the traditional ones (Boswell et al., 2015) . Patient satisfaction affect revenue earned for most of the healthcare organization. Healthcare centers that provide poor services led to the low satisfaction of patient which in turn causes loss of revenue. Healthcare provider can create an environment where the patients can provide a feedback on the service provided. Through this, the health works can work on their weakest area in giving care. 

  Patient safety 

As patients receive the medical care they are at a risk of getting infections. A study has shown that about 20,000 persons in the United States pass away due to infection they get as they receive treatment (Boswell et al., 2015) . Risk of infection can be reduced by implementation of policies and strategies to provide quality care. 

Conclusion 

A healthcare center requires strategies and decisions that will reflect quality care to patients. In nature healthcare delivery is complex; therefore, decisions based on unchanging and expectable systems are not appropriate. New decisions to healthcare providers should be structured in a way that they are easy to implement. For care to be provided in a cooperative way there should be the integration of procedures of care delivery across health works of different specialization. Although a considerable gap still occurs between how care should be given and how it is actually given. The support for the collaborative provision of care in most healthcare center has remained a challenge. 

References 

Boswell, J. F., Kraus, D. R., Miller, S. D., & Lambert, M. J. (2015). Implementing routine outcome monitoring in clinical practice: Benefits, challenges, and solutions. Psychotherapy Research , 25 (1), 6-19. 

Durand, M. A., Moulton, B., Cockle, E., Mann, M., & Elwyn, G. (2015). Can shared decision-making reduce medical malpractice litigation? A systematic review. BMC health services research , 15 (1), 167. 

Shanks, N. H. (2016). Introduction to healthcare management . Jones & Bartlett Publishers. 

Yang, Y. T., & Silverman, R. D. (2014). Mobile health applications: the patchwork of legal and liability issues suggests strategies to improve oversight. Health Affairs , 33 (2), 222-227.