Question

Piedmont Overlook Care Organization Case Study

Piedmont Overlook Care Organization (PPOCO) is a group of medical facilities that provide healthcare services across the Southeast. PPOCO first offered services in 1986 to address medical service needs in the local community. The goal was to provide comprehensive healthcare. It was also the goal to provide services beyond the traditional operating hours of primary care and other doctor offices. PPOCO focuses on total wellness that incorporates an integrative approach to optimize quality patient care.

The mission of POCO is to promote community health by offering a collaborative approach to enhance healthy lifestyles, with cost effective, quality care. POCO is made up of 5 facilities with 10 specialties, 25 doctors, 4 directors, and a number of clinical staff and employees. Over 35% of Overland patients are uninsured.

Organizational Challenges

There has been a rapid growth of healthcare needs in the served areas of Overland Care in the past five years, which is fueled by patient demand for convenient, affordable care. Patients are looking for accessible healthcare that provide access to specialty services with minimal out-of- pocket costs. However, there are some current challenges that both reflect the Overland community and national trends.

• · Growing, over-saturation of emergency room services
• · Growth in patient volume is driven by demographic trends
• · Population of aging patients (over age 65) growing at significant rates
• · Cost of treatment for the POCO continues to rise – yet patient costs remain the same
• · Insurance costs rising – uninsured patients numbers rising
• · Financial profits for POCO down by 12% each year, for the past 4 years
• · POCO collections for patient balances are increasing
• · Compliance audits reveal issues with patient confidentiality and privacy
• · HIPAA training not completed as part of new employee orientation
• · Customer satisfaction rates steady but some significant flags related to ethics.
• · Technology system and electronic health record upgrades needed – interoperability P

For this part of the project, you will compile a summary of your performance improvement initiatives. You will further describe in detail, your chose performance improvement model and how you plan to use it to carry out your initiatives and action items. To outline your action items, consider SWOT analysis outcomes, data management processes, data quality, technology challenges, resources and staffing, work processes, financials, and any information in the POCO case.

Answer 1

Following are few suggested improvements that can contribute towards improving the overall performance and render better and more optimum service to patients.

• Spread awareness about the need of insurance to the population of the area
• Streamline processes, reduce wasteful activities and apply Lean management tools and techniques.
• Facilitate better financial coverage
• Recruitment of suitable and efficient staff including doctors
• Performance management system to ensure overall efficiency
• Improved supply chain management
• Improved inventory management
• more customer-oriented processes
• Conduct regular training as per training schedule
• Reduce paperwork, implement software