Healthcare Program Design and Implementation

Answer

Advocating for the Nursing Role in Program Design and Implementation

Advocacy remains one of the primary roles of nurses since high-quality care goes beyond knowing the disease and making prescriptions. Nurses are instrumental in helping patients make informed decisions concerning their health, the best approach to the available medical solutions, and how to navigate through the much complex medical system. All these translate to better medical terms and improved care coupled with ethical decisions. Notwithstanding, the government also comes to ensure efficiency in healthcare through the formulation of health programs aimed at enhancing the quality of the outcome. Among such programs is the Hospital Readmissions Reduction Program (HRRP) (McIlvennan et al., 2015), as illustrated in the subsequent interview transcript.

Interviewer: Tell us about a healthcare program within your practice. What are the costs and projected outcomes of this program?

Interviewee: The Hospital Readmissions Reduction Program (HRRP) is one of the programs in my practice that has proved instrumental in improving healthcare services. The program was formulated under the Affordable Care Act to help in the reduction of readmission cases and requires the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services to reduce payouts to care that experience massive patient readmissions significantly. The cost of this program relates to the readmission costs that were a massive $41.3 billion in 2012 at the time of implementing this program. By penalizing hospitals with abnormally high readmission rates, the program helps in saving on the cost of healthcare and making services available to other patients. Besides, through the reduction of readmissions, funds can be channeled to improve the infrastructure and quality of services.

Interviewer: Who is your target population?

Interviewee: The program targeted individuals suffering from chronic conditions such as pneumonia, heart attack, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, and coronary artery bypass graft, among others (Gupta et al., 2018). In most cases, there are frequent admissions in such cases within 30 days of discharge. Besides, the program also focused on older patients to help in improving the quality of care they receive.

Interviewer: What is the role of the nurse in providing input for the design of this healthcare program? Can you provide examples?

Interviewee: Nurses play a significant role in providing input in nearly every healthcare program. In the quest to reduce the causes of readmission, nurses help in designing strategies that can be used to assist in improving the quality of outcomes. They provide the practical aspect of the program by ensuring that the program formulators provide the necessary resources to ensure the quality of care and a subsequent reduction of the readmission cases. For example, in handling individuals suffering from pneumonia, the nurses will ensure administration of proper care and discharge done when the person can comfortably undergo through homecare. Essentially, homecare provides a lot of ease to the strained healthcare facilities. However, when patients are discharged prematurely, they have a higher chance of readmission, which makes the nurses be in a critical position to assess their readiness to undergo through homecare.

Interviewer: What is your role as an advocate for your target population for this healthcare program? Do you have input into design decisions? How else do you impact design?

Interviewee: my primary role is to create a substantial level of awareness for the program. In most cases, patients and health service providers alike fail to understand the basics concerning healthcare programs that are beneficial to their welfare. However, it is the role of an advocate like myself to help create awareness by reaching out to other people within the facilities and improving the patients to understand the reason for such initiatives. Designing the program and its implementation at the local level requires every nurse’s input irrespective of the national guidelines toward its incorporation in healthcare (Wadhera et al., 2018). I also impact the design through strategic management and mobilization of resources to help the facility meet the fundamental requirements essential in eliminating readmissions. Furthermore, this has to incorporate health promotion models that require an in-depth conceptualization by every stakeholder.

Interviewer: What is the role of the nurse in healthcare program implementation? How does this role vary between the design and the implementation of healthcare programs? Can you provide examples?

Interviewee: The role of nurses in this program is to develop strategies that will monitor the frequency of readmissions and then assess the underlying factors contributing to such increases. Through these analyses, the main focus then becomes suppressing these factors by every responsible nurse. In the facility, nurses thus take it upon themselves to ensure efficiency in service delivery.

Interviewer: Who are the members of a healthcare team that you believe is most needed to implement to a program? Can you explain why?

Interviewee: The efforts of every healthcare practitioner is critical toward the implementation of this program with a universal outlook that reflects the interest of the patients. Despite the inclusivity of all the practitioners, the institutional leadership has to be at the forefront since the penalties that are likely to arise will grossly affect their services and profitability.

Conclusion

The primary aim of the Affordable Care Act was to create reforms that would ensure the affordability and accessibility of healthcare services. Therefore, the act proposed exciting programs, including HRRP, a program that focuses on proper management of chronic conditions and the elderly to save on the costs of readmissions. Through the various institutions, the program has realized tremendous progress, with the readmission rates significantly reducing as the quality of care increases (Wasfy et al., 2017). It has further contributed to more patient-centeredness, with the nurses playing a vital role in such development.