Quality and performance improvement analysis paper

Introduction

The health care systems should ensure patients safety with the use of efficient systems. However, the
health systems mostly incline in the traditional practice methods where doctors use a pen and paper
and rely to memory to give care to the patients. The medical system requires deliberate redesigning for
reliability, cost- effectiveness and sustained quality improvements to be achieved. The systems should
therefore incorporate specialized methods and tools to increase improvements. As a result, the systems
will attain and enhance safety, effectiveness and efficiency due to acceleration of performance in the
health care system (iPatientCare, 2016).

The use of incentives in the health sector are designed to encourage and motivate health care providers
to perform well and improve the outcome of healthcare practices. The incentives may be provided in
the form of monetary or non-monetary incentives to individuals or organizations. The model primarily
aims to reward high level performances and encourage the low level performers to improve in their
work for reward in the future. More so, the incentives aim at having a long lasting effect on the
performance of health workers.

Incentives model as a way to improve quality and performance

Incentives in the health care system are designed in a manner that reflect the values and goals of the
health care system. They also must match the performance objectives of the institutions bearing in mind
a range of contextual factors to influence the effectiveness of the incentives. The performance based
bonus schedules are a continuous process and there is a wide range of established programs that use
financial and non-financial incentives as a reward to the health care providers for achieving certain set
performance improvements. For instance, the center for Medicare and Medicaid services use the
incentive model to improve performances in their partner hospitals. The highest performing hospitals
receive more bonuses than the low performing hospitals while they may also be subjected to penalties.
The highest performing hospitals also receive other rewards that range from public recognitions due to
their exemplary work which subsequently increases their autonomy for high performance trust.

For the bonuses to work effectively, their size plays a role because the higher the price the higher the
motivation. Furthermore, this model is useful in determining the inability of particular groups or
institutions to meet the desired results. More so, the incentive model may work as a budget neutral
scheme placed in place by the health care purchasers. They provide fundings for hospitals with set
targets that they should achieve. Failure to achieve the targets lead to penalties or the health care
purchasers can set aside performance related fundings until when the provider will be able to meet the
required standards. The penalties issued also play a big role in driving performance and quality because
the organizations are unwilling to incur the extra charges that come with failure to meet goals. The
penalties may however create a negative attitude among the culprits leading to withdrawals from the
collaborative programs. As a result, the set standards for each institution differ and they should start
from a low level performance incremental strategy to motivate them.

The strategy does not affect the current funding level but seeks to alter the future fundings which
should be based on increased performances. The model therefore does not seekt o withhold from
funding institutions but rather increase the fundings based on performance (Custers, et al. 2008).
The incentive model also uses Pay-for-Performance model which seeks to enhance the measures of
quality and efficiency while eliminating excessive costs. The model allows the players to link economic
incentives to operational quality outcomes. Pay-for-Performance assumes that it motivates and make
the providers pursue their work aggressively to attain the quality performance targets. As a result, it
reduces on medical errors and malpractices in the health sector. The method seeks to abolish systems
where medical providers are paid for quantity work but rather promotes quality. According to the UK’s
National Health Service, it introduced the pay-for-performance model in 2004 where 8000 family
physicians and general practitioners agreed to use the model based on 146 quantity indicators. Further
research indicate that the general practitioners and family physicians have increased their pay by an
average of $40000 considering the P4P. it also creates a bond between the employees and the
organizations creating a spirit of dedication and loyalty in their work. The dedication helps the
employees to have a positive impact to the organization and guarantees continued success.

The reward awarded also indicate to the service providers that their efforts and contributions are
important and appreciated. Asa result, they develop a positive attitude which reflects in their work and
how they treat their clients. Studies indicate that hospitals participating in the P4P programs have more
superior outcomes in termes of quality and performances compared to those that do not participate in
the programs (Abduljawad & Al-Assaf, 2011).

Stake holders in the incentive model in health care sector.

The stakeholders in the healthcare systems who should drive the incentives model include the patients,
physicians, insurance companies, pharmaceutical firms, the government and all other employers. They
should all work in cooperation to ensure that the patients receive good health care and the patients
should also be appreciative for the good services they receive from medical facilities. the government
should encourage all the players in the sector to collaborate to improve the quality and performance in
the health care sector.

References

Abduljawad, A., & Al-Assaf, A. F. (2011). Incentives for Better Performance in Health Care. Sultan
Qaboos University Medical Journal, 201-206.

Custers, T., Hurley, J., Klazinga, N. S., & Brown, A. D. (2008). Selecting effective incentive structures in
health care: A decision framework to support health care purchasers in finding the right
incentives to drive performance. BMC Health Services Research.

iPatientCare. (2016). Why Quality Improvement in Healthcare is Important? iPatientCare.