Factors Causing Tensions
Hospitals can only operate efficiency when there is harmony between the governance, medical staff, board of trustees, and administration. However, modern healthcare organizations experience tensions between these stakeholders caused by several organization factors, most of which are internal to the specific hospitals. Between the medical and administrative staff, organization and job characteristics is a critical factor where agreeing on the basic parameters of the job may cause a tension. Poor management on the side of the administrative staff causes issues with both the board and the staff members (Tosanloo et al., 2019). Inefficient communication systems means that emerging problems and other issues can go unresolved, which further increases the tensions between all the four stakeholders.
Every organization has a set of values that govern all operations, practices and processes. The attitudes and perceptions of the medical staff towards these values can cause tensions, especially if the values conflict with the personal belief systems. Behavioral factors, including competition among the medical staff may cause internal problems and administrative issues where cooperation and teamwork are inhibited. Leadership and management styles can have both governance and administrative challenges and resistance from the medical staff (Polyzou and Tsiotras, 2018). The board may be responsible for the direction and practices of the hospital, which means that the administrators would be working towards meeting the board expectations. If the management styles fail to meet the expectations of the medical staff, conflicts and tension may emerge where employees could either resist or have a high turnover.
The role of the board should never be to rubber stamp ideas presented by the administration. When this happens, the hospitals end up serving limited scopes and the board may feen unsatisfied with the administration. Additionally, failure to engage in strategic dialogue may raise issues when blame games start. Insufficient orientation undermines the competence of the medical staff, who require the skills, knowledge and behavior necessary to perform as required. It is the role of the administration to ensure medical staff are properly orientated since performance issues can cause tensions between these stakeholders. Conflict of interest often emerge when the board and the administration influence decisions to suit their needs. For example, members of both the board and administration could have private practice, which could result in roosters designed to create time to manage the side business. Therefore, governance issues emerge where such issues as rules, accountability, and transparency are affected.
Other issues that cause tensions between the administration, medical staff, governance, and the board of trustees include the lack of commitment to continuous learning. The board has the responsibility to engage in strategic dialogue with the administration and cannot rely solely on the information presented by the administrators. Governance ensures that processes and practices meet set standards and comply with legal frameworks, which requires continuous learning throughout the organization. Lack of transparency can be described as governance problem, especially when the entity is under the limelight of the media and the public. Board composition is critical since it influences the direction and the strategic relationship with the other stakeholders. Such problems as conflicts of interest may arise from a poor composition of the board. Lastly, outdates board processes and materials can cause tensions across the entire organizations, especially when the administration is unsuccessful in its efforts to modernize.
Public’s Readiness to Survey Information
LeapFrog Group is one of the organizations that conduct surveys on quality of hospital care and makes the findings available to the public. Such issues as hospital safety are graded using standards set by LeapFrog, including infection rates and surgical injuries (Bates & Singh, 2018). Leapfrog indicates that the findings are used to benchmark performance and assist consumers in making decisions on where to receive care. In my opinion, the public is ready for this information since we are living in an era of enlightenment where people have the right to information. The patient awareness becomes a necessity since they make the choice were they desire to receive care. The information also necessitates hospitals to become more open and transparent, especially when those that do not participate in the surveys are reported. Such organizations may appear suspicious in the eyes of public, which would force them to disclose the relevant data. The fact that healthcare practices can result in adverse events means that the public needs to be well informed.
The public is also ready to learn and understand issues relating to patient safety and quality of care. The argument is that without this understanding the public cannot make informed decisions regarding the choice of hospitals. Quality and safety encompass several aspect of care, including adverse events and human errors. Good ratings can be used by the public as a greenlight to select the hospitals with the expectation that the organization will deliver quality care. Additionally, the public represents the consumer base, which can effectively put pressure on hospitals to improve their practices. Without the information, the public can remain unaware of the critical issues in healthcare and underperforming entities would continue to provide substandard services. The public is ready to become a major player in the improvement of safety and quality of care with the use of the survey information.
Benefits of Physician Entrepreneurship
Physician entrepreneurship can be extremely beneficial for patients, especially where the resulting competition means better services. According to Greenblatt (2021), most of the physician entrepreneurship is innovation-driven, which means that new technologies and medical devices are designed, developed, and used in offering care. The result of medical innovation is that the quality and safety of patient care can be improved. The entrepreneurs are often private individuals whose concern is to solve medical problems with the aim of profiting in the process. Quality and safety of care are some of they problems facing the healthcare, which means that competitive solutions that are technology-driven will go a long way improving the overall patient experience. The entrepreneurs also invest heavily in research and development, majorly since their products have to undergo thorough scrutiny before being approved by the health regulators. Growing research and development only serves to improve the industry as new developments can be informed by research.
Physician entrepreneurship also helps to complement the services offered by public organizations. The competition between hospitals and private entities means that the prices of healthcare can reduce drastically, which makes care more affordable for the patients. Additionally, entrepreneurs often focus on offering new services, which means that patients can experience new and improved services. The process models also change, which helps organizations become more efficient. The ultimate result is that operational costs lower the prices of healthcare. New drugs and positive development in new areas of medicine is another outcome that benefits the patients. The rationale is that entrepreneurs will be seeking to fill medical gaps, which includes unlocking new practices and procedures in healthcare.
References
Bates, D., & Singh, H. (2018). Two decades since to err is human: An assessment of progress and emerging priorities in patient safety.Health Affairs, 37(11), 1736-1743. Web.
Greenblatt, W. (2021). Proportion, type, and characteristics of physician entrepreneurship in Massachusetts.JAMA Network Open, 4(1), 1-12. Web.
Polyzou, M., & Tsiotras, G. (2018). Analysis of determinant factors of conflict in Greek hospitals. International Journal of Caring Sciences, 11(1), 935-946.
Tosanloo, M., Adham, D., Ahmadi, B., Foroshani, A., & Pourreza, A. (2019). Causes of conflict between clinical and administrative staff in hospitals. Journal of Education and Health promotion, 8, 1-6. Web.