Finance
Structure and Overview
The Finance Department at the health center is headed by a finance manager and has three other accounting officers. The role of the finance manager is to oversee the finance operations at the facility. The three accounting officers are tasked with different operational roles at the facility. The department also utilizes two other consultancy firms that assist with the auditing and tax remittances.
The Finance Department is responsible for all the financial operations at the health center. The department prepares all the annual budgets and makes recommendations on the various operations to be carried out based on the funds that are available. The department is responsible for developing and implementing strategies for revenue collection at the facility. The Finance Department is also tasked with the role of engaging with the payers such as insurance companies in following up on claims and implementing the required pay process (Burgess & Radnor, 2013). The health center’s finance department is also responsible for processing the staff’s salary as well as making payments for the related deductions.
Performance
The Finance Department at the health center has continued to demonstrate reliable performance, ensuring the organizational operations are not affected. In the last two financial years, the department has adopted new financial management systems that will enable it to improvement the revenue collection at the health center. The department also managed to successfully file all the taxes for the last three financial years hence avoiding the costs occurring due to delay in tax remittance. The department has also successfully managed to obtain all the revenue from the healthcare funders and other partners for the current financial period. The Finance Department has also successfully procured a credit facility with one of the pharmaceutical companies hence ensuring that the health center will not run out of these supplies.
Performance Appraisal Procedure
The Finance Department has managed to adapt its own performance approach based on the “360-degree-model” that is widely used at the health center. The staff at the department are provided with weekly targets that are well outlined and are required to submit a self-assessment report based on these targets every fortnight (Alsharf, 2015). The reports serve as the main input in the evaluation of their performance as they are awarded a percentage score by the finance manager. At the end of each month, the staff is requested to provide feedback on their colleagues at the department. The finance manager then uses the information to carry out the performance appraisal for his team and help identify areas of strength and the areas of weakness.
Medical Records
Structure and Overview
The Medical Records Department is headed by a headed by Medical Records Manager who works alongside five other staff members. For the department to ensure that its operations run efficiently, it has also engaged three other medical records personnel on a temporary basis to assist with various roles. The manager is responsible for making decisions regarding the role of the department in the overall operations of the health center as well coordinating the upgrades for the current electronic medical records system (Raghupathi & Raghupathi, 2014). The medical records personnel play crucial roles at the health center including data recording and verification to determine the authenticity.
The Medical Records Department is an integral part of the health center as it plays various critical roles. The department serves as the custodian of all the information and data for the patients that seek healthcare services at the health center. The department leads in all the data analytic operations to determine the healthcare trends at the facility. The Medical Records Department also serves as an integral part of the planning team as they offer insights on the operations based on the existing disease patterns (Bardhan & Thouin, 2013).
The department is also responsible for filing all the reports that are required by the state agencies for health. The medical department also collaborates with other primary healthcare organizations and state agencies to carry out appropriate research regarding disease patterns with the aim of informing the policy that governs healthcare provision.
Performance
The Medical Records Department managed to upgrade the current electronic medical records systems that are used at the health center to the latest version. The department has also managed to increase the number of data analytic reports that it provides monthly to facilitate better decision making at the facility. The department has also increased the number of computers that are available for organizations seeking to utilize the data from the health center. The Medical Records Department at the health center has also developed policy guidelines to help partner organizations when making requests to access the patient data from the facility for research purposes.
Performance Appraisal Procedure
The Medical Records Department has also developed an innovative method to apply the “360-degree-model” during its performance appraisal procedures. The department has a metric that is used to determine the staffs’ performance regarding completing various reports and implementing different strategies required to improve the operations at the health center. Another data input for the performance appraisal is the number of data analytics each staff has performed per year which helps to determine the level of initiative to improve the operations. All these inputs are employed by the manager in evaluating the staff during performance evaluation sessions that are held twice per year.
The Finance Department has managed to adapt its own performance approach based on the “360-degree-model” that is widely used at the health center. The staff at the department are provided with weekly targets that are well outlined and are required to submit a self-assessment report based on these targets every fortnight. The reports serve as the main input in the evaluation of their performance as they are awarded a percentage score by the finance manager. At the end of each month, the staff is requested to provide feedback on their colleagues at the department. The finance manager then uses the information to carry out the performance appraisal for his team and help identify areas of strength and the areas of weakness.
Quality and Excellence
Structure and Overview
The Quality and Excellence Department works towards improving the quality of service provided at the health center. The department is also tasked with the role of implementing new strategies to make the patient care at the facility to be aligned with the principles of patient-centered care (Mohammad, 2013). The department is also tasked with the role of ensuring that the health center is compliant to the relevant regulations governing the provision of primary healthcare.
The department is headed by a Quality Assurance Manager who works with a team of five personnel. The manager serves the role of developing policies to improve all the areas of operation at the health center. The other personnel at the department are tasked with the role of doing quality checks on the different areas within the health center. The department also engages external consultants to facilitate the review of the processes and develop various policies to facilitate the process of quality assurance.
Performance
The Quality and Excellence Department at the health center has been conducting quality training for all the clinical staff at the health facility in the past three months with a focus to help reduce infection control. The department also created a system for patients to raise complaints regarding the services provided at the facility. The department has also established a weekly training program through which they intend to train the patients concerning their rights as part of their patient advocacy operations. The Quality and Excellence Department has also been working with the medical records personnel to develop a new system for health informatics that will be used to analyze data at the health center.
Performance Appraisal Procedure
The Quality and Excellence Department implements the “360-degree-model” in a manner that enables the department to meet its objectives. Given that most of the roles are carried out in a team set up, each staff are requested to provide feedback on their colleague before the assessments are carried out. The feedback is sent to the manager either in written or verbal form. The manager uses this feedback to rate the staff during the monthly performance review sessions. The performance appraisal also serves as a session for the manager to set goals for the staff regarding the quality initiatives that they should undertake.
Management Cycle
All the three departments employ an innovative management cycle aimed at facilitating the provision of quality services. The management cycle in three departments starts with the development of a measure and achievable objectives. The managers in each department are tasked with overseeing the implementation of the various objectives together with their teams (Langabeer & Helton, 2015). The managers are expected to provide their teams with regular feedback based on their general performance. The final stage of the management cycle includes the review of the objectives to determine if the team have achieved all their objectives and to set the objectives for the next cycle.
References
Alsharf, I. A. (2015). Performance Management in Healthcare. Journal of Applied Management and Investments, 4(1), 45-52.
Bardhan, I. R., & Thouin, M. F. (2013). Health information technology and its impact on the quality and cost of healthcare delivery. Decision Support Systems, 55(2), 438-449.
Burgess, N., & Radnor, Z. (2013). Evaluating lean in healthcare. International Journal of Health Care Quality Assurance, 26(3), 220-235.
Langabeer II, J. R., & Helton, J. (2015). Health care operations management. Massachusetts: Jones & Bartlett Publishers.
Mohammad, A. (2013). Healthcare service quality: Towards a broad definition. International Journal of Health Care Quality Assurance, 26(3), 203-219.
Raghupathi, W., & Raghupathi, V. (2014). Big data analytics in healthcare: promise and potential. Health Information Science and Systems, 2(1), 3-8.