Health Medical Homework Help

The Institute of Medicine (now a renamed as a part of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine) defined patient-centered care as: “Providing care that is respectful of and responsive to individual patient preferences, needs, and values, and ensuring that patient values guide all clinical decisions.”[1] While this definition clearly emphasizes the importance of a patient’s perspective in the context of clinical care delivery, it does not allow managers to focus on the actual “person” inside the institutional role of the patient.

In the same sense that a person who is incarcerated in a prison may receive extremely humane treatment, the “person” is still defined into the role of an “inmate,” and as such cannot, by definition, be granted the same rights and privileges as a non-institutionalized member of the civil order enjoys. In other words, I may be placed in a cell with great empathy and understanding of my preferences, needs, and values, but I am still being locked-up in jail.

No one is suggesting that being admitted into a jail cell is the same as being admitted into a hospital bed. There are many obvious differences between the two, including the basic purpose of the two institutions.

But while much is different, what is the same is how a pre-existing set of structured behaviors and processes are used to firmly, and without asking or negotiating, radically transform a “regular” person into a defined role of a “patient” that then can be diagnosed, treated, and discharged back into the world once the patient has finished their “time” in the “system.”

While patient-centered care emphasizes the value of increased sensitivity to a patient’s preferences, needs, and values, what we want to focus on is how decisions made by healthcare leaders affect the actual experience of a person receiving that care.

So with the “real person” in mind, this week’s question is:

What can healthcare leaders do to improve the actual personal experience that “real people” go through as our “patients?”

(develop answers bearing in mind, the review of the definition and roles of “Leadership”).

[1] Institute on Medicine, Crossing the Quality Chasm: A New Health System for the 21^st Century, March 2001.