Quality Management Tools and Applications to Improve Safety in Healthcare

Quality Management
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Quality Management
Quality management healthcare is a critical component in ensuring improved health outcomes for patients. A quality healthcare system is one that is accessible, appropriate, affordable, available, safe, integrated, efficient, and focused on the patient (Saver et al., 2015). Therefore, quality management in healthcare entails reducing medication errors, making healthcare series accessible and affordable, and improving patient care (Spath, 2018). According to the Institute of Medicine (IOM), quality refers to “the degree to which health care services for individuals and populations increase the likelihood of desired health outcomes and are consistent with current professional knowledge (Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality, n.d.)." The institute also identifies various domains of quality in healthcare, namely effectiveness, efficiency, equity, safety, timeliness, and patient-centeredness (Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality, n.d.).
Soldiers' Home in Holyoke, Massachusetts, is a state-funded and fully accredited multifaceted healthcare facility that offers quality healthcare to veterans. The facility, which was established in 1952, offers different services, including hospice care, on-site dental clinic, full-time residential accommodations, a multi-service outpatient department, and a veteran’s assistance center. Despite being such an important institution in the delivery of care to veterans in the state, the health facility has continued to experience significant challenges that have undermined the quality of its services. The 247-bed nursing home is understaffed, limiting its ability to offer quality care, particularly during these strange times marred by the Coronavirus Disease (COVID-19) pandemic. The inadequate staffing levels left the hospital ill-equipped to deal with the pandemic, thereby orchestrating a further spread of the disease among veterans. This paper analyzes the situation at Soldiers' Home in Holyoke and recommends the various quality management tools that the organization could use to salvage the situation.
The Quality Management Tools and Applications that the Leaders at Holyoke Soldiers' Home Could Have Used to Improve Patient and Employee Safety
Several tools can be used to improve quality management in healthcare. In the case of Holyoke Soldiers' Home, the tools that could help the leaders manage and improve quality at the facility include Root-Cause Analysis, Six Sigma, and Total Quality Management (Ross, 2014). Root-Cause Analysis is a problem-solving technique that focuses on identifying the root cause of the problem in the best way possible (Ross, 2014). According to this approach, every problem a root cause, and eliminating that root cause can eliminate the problem (DeForge, 2020). Therefore, by addressing the root cause, it is expected that the problem will never recur. Leaders at Holyoke Soldiers' Home could use this approach to identify the root cause of the challenges they experience at the facility and address any such causes. For example, if the decreas...