Question

What is the greatest financial obstacle to quality in health care? Include research and anecdotal evidence to defend your claims.

Answer 1

Ans) Physicians, physician assistants, and advanced practice nurses frequently cited financial obstacles as major problems, though physicians were most likely to report these problems. Between 15% and 54% of ambulatory care providers reported that these obstacles were major problems:

• high liability insurance rates,
• large increases in non-reimbursable overhead
costs (particularly problematic for primary care
providers),
• inadequate or slow third-party payment,
• non-paying patients/bad debt, and
• insufficient income (particularly problematic for
primary care and solo practice providers).

- Health executives continue to seek approaches to rein in the costs of their core operations, reduce utilization through standardization, and manage care variations.

- Even high-performing organizations can obtain additional cost containment by taking a systems approach that is rigorous and transparent.

- These pressures won't subside while the gap between current cost and quality and where everyone needs to get to is still significant.

- The building block is operational efficiency, such as optimizing staffing and managing the supply chain efficiently.

- But fundamentally changing the way care is delivered with the right providers at the right place at the right time, reducing unnecessary services and focusing on value – that's where the next wave of benefit is going to occur.