Good resource allocation is an essential aspect of effective hospital management. Resource allocation covers diverse aspects of healthcare facilities such as employees, beds, and funds. Though all hospitals focus on providing efficient and improved healthcare facilities to the population, there are different structures and governance in hospitals which result in differences in resource allocation and the kind of services people receive. For example, nonprofit, for-profit, and public with each kind of hospital associated with advantages and disadvantages to the community (Alexander & Lee, 2006). Despite the differences, people have intents and purposes for visiting different types of services but the nature of resource allocation appears to be the fundamental reason behind the particular choices that people usually have when it comes to the allocation of resources. The objective of this paper is to analyze the advantages and disadvantages of public, nonprofit, and for-profit hospitals focusing on resource allocation.
Nonprofit hospitals experience various benefits such as tax-exempt which gives them an opportunity for free services to patients. People in a community where there are several nonprofit hospitals are located; people tend to enjoy greater services without any form of compensation. Though the burden of compensated services is not equally conducted by all nonprofit hospitals, there is equality in hospitals in the same geographical region. Nonprofit hospitals offer expensive services such as high-level trauma or intensive care burn wards which do not provide much profit (Alexander& Lee, 2006). Despite these benefits associated with nonprofit hospitals, it is evident that there exist some disadvantages. For instance, nonprofit hospitals do not offer quality services because of the high population of patients and fewer nurses to attend to patients. Such healthcare facilities also struggle to acquire funds needed in improving technology and are offered in the hospital.
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For-profit hospitals charge for services they offer to patients with an intention of increasing gaining benefits from the services. In this case, patients have to pay compensation for the services they receive. For-profit services are smaller I size and they ensure there is personalized care for all people who seek services in the hospital. The effectiveness of resource allocation result from the fact that patients have a specified number of patients they have to attend rather than attending to dozens of patients. In effect, waiting time tend to be short because the number of employees tends to match the number of people visiting the facility. Profits received from the services they offer are also essential for acquiring all the services received from the hospital. There are some drawbacks associated with profit hospitals. For example, they have the right to refuse to offer treatment to people especially in situations where they think the patient cannot afford to pay. Though such healthcare facilities offer quality services, it is evident that they are generally expensive and their treatment is limited to the poor.
Public hospitals usually make some charges for treatment services offered to patients but they tend to be a bit cheaper compared to private hospitals because they are publicly funded and they are not for profit (Ramamonjiarivelo et al., 2017). As a result, they are not likely to turn anyone away from seeking their services because they have a chance for experiencing financial support from the public in case of financial strain. Public healthcare facilities usually have several services such as beds that can accommodate many patients. Public hospitals usually have drawbacks because they have challenges in ensuring that patient to doctor ratio is efficiently allocated. In some cases, one doctor usually experiences workload because they have to attend to many patients. As a result, it is difficult and challenging for people to acquire quality services in public hospitals because of the inefficient allocation of resources.
Governance plays an essential role in determining the allocation of resources in hospitals. Their role differs depending on the nature of the healthcare facility such as for-profit, nonprofit and allocation of resources in public hospitals. Identified governance, administration, stakeholder engagement, decision making and implementation of resources are some of the essential aspects of resource allocation (Chinitz, 2014). If brads hospital was a public rather than a for-profit hospital, the situation would have been different as opposed to when it is a for-profit hospital. During this period, the administrator had a bottom line in experiencing millions of benefits which they used to expand their services in different regions. In this case, the governance in brad hospital decided to increase their services thus maximizing profits. However, if brad hospital was not for a profit health facility, the government would have made an alternative decision for improving services in the hospital thus increasing their ability to serve the interests of the community such as increasing the number of employees and improving treatment technology.
If Brad was a public or nonprofit healthcare facility, hospital governance would encourage people from the community. In this case, the hospital administration would encourage people to acquire services needed in the hospital. In this case, people would be guaranteed that the funds they offer would be beneficial to the members of the community. In this case, members of the society believed that their resources would not remain in the society. If the hospital was not for profit or public facility, corporate leadership would find it easy to engage stakeholders in giving donations. Whenever public hospitals experience falling incomes, they end up receiving funds from the government and political leaders because they focus on creating adequate access for healthcare services to the people in the society (Chinitz, 2014). Though corporate governance is essential in the decision process, allocation of resources in public hospitals does not require administrative leaders from the community to oversee resources. If Brad was public or nonprofit hospital corporate governance would also recognize the existence of a community board of governance thus preventing the flow of funds raised to private pockets.
In the case of allocating resources in different ethical dilemmas, it is evident that Brad experiences several, dilemmas in allocating cash flow. Corporate leadership has to make decisions such as whether to expand resources such as drugs, facilities, equipment, knowledge, and healthcare facilities in the hospital or to expand services in other regions. Brad hospitals experience challenges in determining the extent to which people develop skills to distribute resources such that every person in the population has the right to access resources in the community and the notion that community involved in the fundraising should have access to effective treatment services in the society (Rushton, 2016). In some extent, expanding services to the community will be a fundamental approach for ensuring equity in the provision of health services but this could be done at the expense of the community members involved in the fundraising process. Involvement of the corporate leadership monitors the allocation of the cash flow to avoid the inflow of money to the pockets of wealthy people. Involvement of community hospitals creates a dilemma when it comes to a diversion of resources to more beneficial regions or to concentrate the funds in one region.
Public, for-profit, and nonprofit healthcare facilities usually have both advantages and disadvantages to community members. Public and nonprofit healthcare facilities usually provide services to patients without compensation and there is a likelihood that they accommodate and offer treatment to the majority of people in the community including poor people. In situations where people need services such as expensive treatment such as education and allocation of resources, there is a possibility that they can get such services in public and nonprofit healthcare facilities. Though for-profit hospitals tend to be expensive, they offer personalized care because they tend to admit a number of patients they can accommodate. When it comes to the role of governance, public, nonprofit and for-profit hospitals usually have differences in the manner in which they manage and allocate resources.
References
Alexander, J. A., & LEE, S. Y. D. (2006). Does governance matter? Board configuration and performance in not ‐ for ‐ profit hospitals. The Milbank Quarterly , 84 (4), 733-758.
Chinitz, D. (2014). Governing the allocation of scarce resources: is health care no longer a special case?. Israel journal of health policy research , 3 (1), 23.
Ramamonjiarivelo, Z., Hearld, L. R., & Weech-Maldonado, R. J. (2017). The Impact of Public Hospitals’ Privatization on Nurse Staffing. In Academy of Management Proceedings (Vol. 2017, No. 1, p. 16896). Briarcliff Manor, NY 10510: Academy of Management.
Rushton, C. H. (2016). Creating a culture of ethical practice in health care delivery systems. Hastings Center Report , 46 , S28-S31.
