Introduction
The healthcare fraternity plays a significant role in individuals’ and societies’ well-being. Accordingly, 2019 through 2022 remains a critical period for the healthcare industry. COVID-19 emergence and the pandemic’s stern effects on societies’ socioeconomic wellness globally pushed everyone beyond the limits. Governments acted laws, including some that required people not to travel, but failed to contain the pandemic effectively. However, healthcare professionals’ operational partnerships with other stakeholders worldwide delivered reliable results. Therefore, the passage of laws concerning health care issues’ management alone cannot make societies healthy without medical professionals’ commitment to implement the new programs.
H.R.1319 – American Rescue Plan Act of 2021
The American Rescue Plan Act of 2021 is a new American law covering the healthcare department and several other sectors. The decree is part of President Biden’s focus to revive the U.S. economy and society from the pandemic’s negative effects. The bill sets aside financial kits for different programs. Accordingly, the law sets 50 billion dollars to finance supplementary COVID-19 testing and contact tracing (U.S. Congress, 2021). Additional 7.66 billion dollars is the budget for increasing the public health workforce’s size, while $16 billion goes to funding vaccine dissemination and supply chains (U.S. Congress, 2021). The regulation further provides $47.8 billion to increase nationwide COVID-19 testing and augment contract-tracing abilities with novel investments to enlarge laboratory volumes and establish mobile testing units. The law then sets aside approximately $14 billion to hasten COVID-19 vaccines supply and administration across the republic (U.S. Congress, 2021). Accordingly, the American Rescue Plan Act of 2021 provides a comprehensive legal plan that can revitalize the nation but requires medical professionals’ backup to deliver the intended results.
The American Rescue Plan Act of 2021 requires multiple players’ coordination to function effectively. Nurses’ excessive numbers, special roles, unique education, and respect among community members make them some of the most reliable professionals in the transformation agenda. Specific actions targeted by the new law include tracking, testing, and administering COVID-19 vaccines. Other vital activities comprise vulnerable groups’ identification and the verification of vaccine’s safety (U.S. Congress, 2021). Importantly, nurses’ primary role in the law’s enactment concerns stakeholders’ coordination. COVID-19 management involves multiple players, including national and international, all of whom require synchronization to deliver effective results. Nurses’ diverse training, including healthcare activities management, puts them at the center of the whole process of transforming the healthcare system (Loke et al., 2021). The American Rescue Plan Act of 2021 mainly sets aside money for various undertakings but never lays down the procedures to manage the pandemic. The condition thus infers the need for the customarily diverse and informed medical team of nurses to take the leadership role, reinstating the professionals’ central role in the new regulation’s performance.
Effects of New Quality Measures and the Pay-For-Performance Paradigm
The change from fee-for-service to a value-based purchasing program alters the old-style model of healthcare payment, thus affecting nurses and the other players. The former (fee-for-service) system maintained a reimbursement structure based on the number of procedures, tests, and visits, leading to high care costs (Manchikanti et al., 2019). However, America now relies on value-based payments, where care providers earn based on the general quality of care delivered. According to Da Silva et al. (2020), the offered treatment must be safe, efficient, timely, effective, justifiable, and patient-centered for medics to earn based on the new remuneration paradigm. The change in payment and quality measurement tactics in the healthcare platform impacts patient outcomes differently. Agarwal et al. (2020) note that the shift to a value-based payment system forces care providers to collaborate to offer cure-focused attention, unlike before. The new paradigm provides cumulative pay for a patient’s case management, which all the involved care providers subdivide. Therefore, America’s new quality dealings and pay-for-performance help patients to receive improved quality of care while promoting medical professionals’ collaboration.
Professional Nursing Leadership and Management Roles that have Arisen
American patients seeking treatment under the fee-for-service scheme experienced a disconnected care system. However, the new remuneration scheme pays all the medics and facilities involved in treating a specific case a cumulative figure (Manchikanti et al., 2019). The policy further holds responsible all the involved parties in case a particular patient’s treatment outcome goes wrong or fails to meet the set standards. For instance, the present Medicaid and Medicare terms reduce facilities’ reimbursements significantly whenever a case they are handling keeps returning to the hospital or patients develop facility-acquired complications (Agarwal et al., 2020). Thus, the new system requires medics to program themselves effectively to fit and benefit. To curb the punishments and promote earnings, professional nurses now hold leadership roles meant to ensure operational collaboration across the entire care delivery line. The nurses work with social workers, professional psychologists, operation doctors, and rehabilitation nurses to ensure real healing among all patients, thus promoting quality of care in the nation.
Predictions for the Practice of Nursing in the Next Five Years
The COVID-19 pandemic, the changing legal requirements concerning care delivery, and the developing interest in sustainable health care are critical issues inferring potential changes in nursing practices and roles. The pandemic’s effects still trouble the world, while new solutions continue to emerge, all requiring the nursing professional to act creatively and responsibly. The pandemic’s condition continues to expose more nurses to the research sector while others perfect mobile care delivery practices (Quinn et al., 2021). Therefore, it is likely that some nurses will continue reaching the elderly and the disconnected populations at their residences moving onwards, especially if laws, such as the American Rescue Plan Act of 2021, continue to exist. The decree provides finances to support mobile testing of COVID-19 and vaccine administration (U.S. Congress, 2021), making it possible for nurses to continue delivering home care even after the pandemic. Additionally, the desire for sustainable care slowly drifts nurses and other medics to establish insurance firms-independent hospitals running on donations and trust funds (Marom & Lussier, 2020). The new development arises from the realization that leaving care costs to the government limits people’s potential to regulate the sector’s happenings.
Conclusion
America’s healthcare sector realizes significant changes due to the pandemic and the emerging focus on care delivery improvement. The American Rescue Plan Act of 2021 is a new law meant to cushion citizens from COVID-19’s adverse effects. The decree sets aside finances for various activities, including research, virus testing, vaccination, medics’ loans, education support funds, and outreach care services delivery. Accordingly, the enactment of medication-related laws alone cannot provide the intended quality of health in America. The matter brings in the aspect of medical professionals, particularly nurses and nurse managers. The professionals’ primary role in transforming care access and quality involves care teams’ coordination for comprehensive treatment and healing. The enactment of complementary regulations in the U.S. makes it possible for the nation to realize some long-dreamt medication outcomes. The nursing professionals’ large numbers, special training, and positive rating by the masses put them at the center of the sector’s transformation.
References
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Da Silva, E. A. P. B., Ruschel, K. B., Polanczyk, C. A., & Urman, R. D. (2020). Advances in value-based healthcare by the application of time-driven activity-based costing for inpatient management: a systematic review. Value in Health, 23(6), 812-823. Web.
Loke, A. Y., Guo, C., & Molassiotis, A. (2021). Development of disaster nursing education and training programs in the past 20 years (2000–2019): A systematic review. Nurse Education Today, 99(1), 104809. Web.
Manchikanti, L., Soin, A., Mann, D. P., Bakshi, S., Pampati, V., Kaye, A. D., & Hirsch, J. A. (2019). Utilization patterns of facet joint interventions in managing spinal pain: A retrospective cohort study in the US fee-for-service Medicare population. Current Pain and Headache Reports, 23(10), 1-12. Web.
Marom, S., & Lussier, R. N. (2020). Corporate social responsibility during the coronavirus pandemic: An interim overview. Business and Economic Research, 10(2), 250. Web.
Quinn, M. M., Markkanen, P. K., Galligan, C. J., Sama, S. R., Lindberg, J. E., & Edwards, M. F. (2021). Healthy aging requires a healthy home care workforce: The occupational safety and health of home care aides. Current Environmental Health Reports, 8(3), 235-244. Web.
U.S. Congress. (2021). H.R. 1319: American Rescue Plan Act of 2021. Web.