Essay Example on Healthcare System: People, Organizations, Resources

Introduction

A healthcare system is a combination of people organizations and resources that work to provide health care services to meet the health needs of people (Jensen & Morrisey, 1986). The people who are essential in a healthcare setting include nurses, physicians, surgeons, and physician assistants. The healthcare staff also includes specialized service providers such as physiotherapists, psychiatrists, radiographers, and dentists. In an organized healthcare system, every member of the team performs their duties with a lot of responsibility. In a value-based healthcare system, health service providers receive payment according to the outcome of their service. The management pays the health staff according to the improvement of the patients. This health system is different from the fee-for-service system where the healthcare workers receive remuneration per volume of service they offer.

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Roles of Members of Healthcare Staff

In every healthcare organization, nurses play an essential role. The doctors serve an integral part in observing and managing the patient's condition. The consultant doctors are available for patients to see them at specific moments. It is the role of a senior doctor to supervise the activities of other doctors. The resident doctor usually serves to monitor the condition of patients in the wards. The other type of doctor, the register doctor, has a role to check on patients in the ward. The register doctors are also available for patients in the wards, and you can call them any time.

The nurses serve an essential role of aiding the doctors to ensure that they help patients to recover. Nurses manage the ongoing care of patients in the healthcare center. The nurses also have a role in assessing, planning and managing the daily treatment and the general health of patients. Nurses also direct patients to the places and the persons to visit to seek help in the healthcare center. In a healthcare organization, there may be different types and ranks of nurses. The Nurse Unit Manager runs the ward and ensures that all the patients in the ward have received the necessary help. The Associate Nurse Manager helps the Nurse Unit Manager in running the ward. Another type of nurse who may be available in a health care unit is the Registered Nurses. The role of Registered nurses is to provide day to day services in the health care center, such as attending to patients and aiding the doctors. A healthcare center may also have an enroll nurse whose work is to provide medical care under the senior nurses' supervision.

A healthcare unit also needs to have some exclusive members of staff called allied health professionals. The allied professionals serve roles that include assessing, diagnosing, and working to prevent disease and disability. These specialize in the provision of at least one service in the healthcare center. These include dentists, therapists, pharmacists, physiotherapists as well as radiographers.

Other health service providers are the support staff. These are members of health staff who perform general tasks in the healthcare organization. The support health staff includes those who offer laundry service, those who serve patients with meals, and those who do housekeeping jobs (Jensen & Morrisey, 1986). Clinical assistants have a responsibility of doing the ward housekeeping jobs. The porter helps in carrying and lifting items belonging to patients. The patient service assistant brings meals and drinks to the patients in the wards. Other members of the health support staff are the ward clerks and the volunteers.

Importance of the Value-Based System

The adoption of the value-based system of healthcare will significantly improve the health sector in the US. The central importance of the system is that it will make healthcare to become more economical. Patients will now spend less money to acquire improved healthcare service. Patients with chronic diseases and complications will be paying less for the management of their health condition. Diseases like diabetes, hypertension, and cancer, which are usually very expensive to treat, will become cheaper to manage (Barnes et al., 2016).

A value-based healthcare system helps patients to recover quickly from their conditions. The faster patients recover, the more the medical staff gets paid, and this makes the doctors and nurses more committed to helping the patients recover. Patients, therefore, will have to spend less money in visiting the doctors and recover quickly.

The value-based healthcare system may improve the state's health sector because it will make the health staff more competent. The improvement in the competence of the medical practitioners would make patient satisfaction to increase significantly. Healthcare service providers will have to more time and dedicate more effort to helping patients recover and control diseases. The quality of the services of the practitioners to the patients will increase when the payment is based on value rather than volume.

The adoption of a value-based healthcare system makes the provision of health service to become more economical. Employers pay less and reduce risk when they adopt this system of healthcare. When payment is based on quality, a small investment that the management makes translates to high output. Patients will be able to recover fast, and so the organization minimizes the cost of operation.

The value-based healthcare management system makes the suppliers reorient their terms with the outcomes of patients. The government increases the expenditure on medical supplies when the effectiveness of the medicine increases. The effect of an increase in spending on medication is that the suppliers might raise the price. Increased price results in higher profits.

When a country adopts the payment of health staff based on the value of their work, the society becomes healthier. The value-based healthcare system also makes medical services affordable to the community. People spend less money to manage chronic diseases and pay less on hospital admission. The value-based healthcare system is ideal in countries with middle-income earners.

Effect of Current Policy on Healthcare Staff

The current policy in healthcare provision in the US has made medical practitioners more effective. Before introducing the system, surgeons needed to first inquire about the patients' financial stability before conducting surgery on them. Now the doctors and surgeons do not have to look for the financial background of those they will have to treat. Every person must have a health insurance plan, and therefore, the patient's financial stability does not influence the treatment. The use of insurance policies has made medical operations more affordable and accessible.

The US healthcare policy outlines the roles of health organizations. The function of the healthcare system is to treat, diagnose, and prevent diseases and injuries. The plan requires the organizations to attend the patients first, and the insurance companies pay the healthcare centers later. The policy has made nurses and doctors concentrate on attending patients rather than first asking them to pay.

The medical policy has also resulted in improved healthcare service staff by ensuring that all the required medicines and tools are present. The physicians are, therefore, able to get all the items they may need and become more productive. To make the practitioners more active, the government introduced healthcare policy. The policy has ensured each healthcare organization has access to medical information technology.

Nurses in Free-for-System Vs. Value-Based Care System

The free for the system is very different from the value-based healthcare system. In the free-for order, the nurses get paid according to the number of patients they attend. On the other hand, the value-based healthcare system pays the workers according to how effective they are. When a country adopts the value-based system, it pays the employees according to how effective they are in treating and controlling diseases.

Nurses in the free-for system work hard to serve many patients while in a value-based order, they concentrate on improving the quality of service they provide. The free for healthcare service requires patients or third-party payers to pay for the service after the providers have provided it. On the other hand, the value-based healthcare system pays excellent attention to patients' health before making the payment. While the free-for healthcare system majors on increasing the number of patients one serves, value-based service ensures that the patients get quality service.

The nurses in the free-for health care system may not be as practical as in the free-for service. The nurses emphasize dealing with many patients to earn a significant amount. On the other hand, a nurse in the value-based system ensures that they serve the patients best to maximize the income.

In the free-for health system, patients could not get quality service due to a lack of specialized tools and incentives. On the other hand, the value-based healthcare system uses modern technology and motivates workers to improve the patients' status. The free-for system was expensive, while the value-based healthcare system is economical.

The fee for service healthcare lacked a way of sharing patient data, which led to a communication breakdown. At the same time, the value-based system has become more effective due to the use of information technology. Nurses are now able to pass and receive information to doctors and other nurses quickly.

Effects of Shared Power between Nurses and Doctors

Doctors and nurses are now cooperating to make handling of patients easy. The practitioners are currently working in collaboration to improve health service. The coordination between the physicians and their nurses has resulted in easing of sharing responsibilities. When the two types of employees work together, they become instrumental in attending to patients. Healthcare, therefore, becomes greatly improved.

Cooperation between nurses and doctors eliminates the communication barrier and makes sharing of patients' data very easy. The result of smooth communication in healthcare centers is that doctors and nurses can minimize errors. The outcome of medical activities becomes good, and patients get quality service. The effect of the improved service is job satisfaction and high quality service.

Shared leadership between nurses and the doctors makes the nurses more comfortable and, therefore, minimizes nurses leaving the job. The healthcare centers enjoy the presence of adequate employees. Good cooperation between the two elements makes the healthcare sector to become very useful. The nurses do not see the doctors as their dictators but coordinate with them for better results.

When nurses and doctors practice shared responsibility, the nurses develop a positive attitude towards the doctors. The effect of a good rapport is that the healthcare sector becomes greatly improved. A good relationship at work ensures that healthcare centers have enough workers.

Conclusion

The success of the healthcare sector of any country dramatically depends on the effectiveness of the health staff. In an organized healthcare system, each member of the team knows and does their work effectively. The value-based healthcare system is more beneficial and useful than the fee for service system. Organized health policy has dramatically improved the healthcare sector in the US. For a country to ensure that the healthcare system is effective, there is a need to ensure cooperation among all workers in the sector.