Tag: Improving patient care with technologies

Improving The Quality Of Patient Care

Developing the patient care program is one of the priorities of all health care providers. The quality of patient care is determined by the quality of the facilities, infrastructure and the competence of the personnel.

There are many factors that patients and families consider when choosing a hospital. One of the factors is the quality of patient care and the satisfaction experienced by patients and their families. That is why it is necessary for hospitals to follow strict quality and safety practices. Hospitals should always find ways to improve their services.

It is true that patients are the most important people in a medical care system. They deserve to be treated well. In order to satisfy the patients and their families, it is necessary to improve the quality of patient care. There are a lot of factors that can improve the quality of patient care. Hospitals should have well-trained staff to provide high quality care with desirable outcome. All the necessary equipment should be in place and properly maintained. This is important for the hospital’s performance and it contributes significantly to better results in providing best health care. It is also necessary to continually use newer technologies that improve the quality of health care.

Improvement of patient care is a continuous process because a lot of new technologies are coming out. The personnel also play a big role in giving the best services to patients. They should have proper training in order to address the concerns of the patients and families.

Patients’ safety is the corner stone of high- quality health care. That is why it is a big challenge for the hospital on how to offer good services to their patients.

Improved Patient Care

Health is wealth, as the saying goes. And for those who are not in good health, the next best thing that we can ask for is to receive the best patient care from our health care providers. With the increasing demand for better care, greater awareness among the public, more health care regulation, keener competition, the rise in medical malpractice litigation, and concern about poor outcomes, we can say that improving patient care should be a priority.

To improve patient care, there are medical and non-medical factors to be considered, as well as a comprehensive system that is “patient oriented” and improves both medical and non-medical aspects must be adopted.

Before anything else, it must be recognized by all those who work in the system that the patient is the most important person in a medical care system. This single factor makes a significant difference to the patient care in any hospital. With patients being the priority, the health care provider is able to create a management system that emphasizes on cost recovery. A patient who receives high quality services and can afford it is one way to tell that patient care has improved and at the same time patient satisfaction is higher.

The non-medical factors that should be considered to improve patient care are the following: accessibility and availability of both hospital and the physician should be assured to all those who require health care, waiting times for services should be minimized, information should be made very clear, check-in and check-out procedures should be “patient-friendly”, communication with the patient and the family about possible delay should be done, and ancillary services should be available to both patient and attending families.

Some of the medical aspects to be considered for improved patient care are: well-trained personnel, present and properly maintained equipment, use of proper instruments, use of appropriate medications, and use of newer technologies.

Technology: A Blessing and Curse to Patient Care

The combination of knowledge, experience, and skills are needed for nurses to meet the changing needs of their patients. A large demand of patient care and safety is based on the work of nurses. When care is sub par, because of certain inappropriate situations, nurses shoulder the responsibility. Having an understanding and engagement of strategies to improve quality of care and safety is paramount to a nurse’s work.

A lot of factors affect the quality and safety of care provided by nurses such as environment, organizations, and systems. When teams function well and organization structures support their work, nurses are able to perform their job better with a high intensity of care.

In the past, nurses relied heavily on their senses to monitor their patients and look for changes. As time passed, inaccurate use of senses were replaced with precision-based technologies designed to detect changes to patient’s conditions. Over time, technology has become extremely helpful tot the nursing career.

While technology has potentially improved patient care and safety, it is not without risks. Technology has been accounted for bringing a solution and added problems for safer health care. Problems may rise based on the sheer number of new devices, the complexity and careless introduction in using them.

Although billions and billions of dollars have been spent every year on medical devices and equipment, nurses has paid little attention to technological implementation and integration.

Technology also has introduced many errors and unintended mistakes. For instance the use of bar code system. Many believe that the bar coding medication administration reduces the medication errors, it was also believed to decreased physician’s ability to accurately deviate routine administration sequences.

Another disadvantage of using technology is the associated expenditure. Not all hospitals can afford high-end equipments and devices. That is why more development is needed to more effectively introduce new technologies, reducing the risk to the patient care, and stress on nurses.