Future Reform of the Health Care System - Research Paper Example

? Future Reform of the Health Care System Indicate Here of your Health is one of the most important aspects of human life and no life can suffice without proper healthcare in place. In order to ensure that the healthcare status is at its best, there are a number steps that are being taken either by the government or other concerned bodies. This is mainly through the formulation of health policies and guidelines. An aspect of these policies is financial management. Without proper financial management, no healthcare program can succeed. In this paper, an exposition on what needs to be done in order to ensure that finances are well managed in as far as healthcare is concerned will be looked at. Future Reform of the Health Care System In order to ensure efficiency and accountability in health services as far as financial management is concerned, there are a number of things that need to be done within the health sector, especially in Health reform policies. The problem of financial management has been an ongoing one within the health sector for quite a long time. (Dietrich & Anderson, 2012). This therefore calls for ways and means through which the same problem can be taken care of in order to ensure that the health of the people is not compromised because of poor methods used in finance management. To begin with, one of the problems that bring out a compromise in provision of health care is lack of a standardized form of medical billing, especially between the private and public health providers. (Chawla, 2007). This escalates further into having discrepancies in medical billings from suppliers of medicine, services and other medical facilities. As such, it is hard to come up with or establish who is saying the truth during the procurement of medical services. (Dietrich & Anderson, 2012). The most worrying fact is that all these problems end up landing in the pockets of the patients, who are forced to pay for the unjustifiably inflated prices. (Gruen & Howarth, 2005). In addition to this, it is also hard to standardize the treatment that healthcare givers give to their patients given that it is hard to quantify and thus attach a standard price to these services. Again, the doubt and ambiguity translates into a misfortune as far as the patient is concerned. (Chawla, 2007). Given this, there is need to have a system within the policies and reform propositions that can allow the standardization of prices of healthcare equipment, services and available medicine. This should be well document, published and availed to all the citizens. By so doing, accountability will be made possible since no one will be able to hide under the conflicting prices of medical care to defraud the public. Secondly, there is need to have a system in place that can allow adequate training of all the stake holders as far as financial management within the health sector is concerned. Among the areas where there is need in training as far as expenditure on medication is concerned is budgeting. (Gruen & Howarth, 2005). Firstly, people need to be trained on how they can facilitate saving in as far as expenditure on medication is concerned. The pressure of poor budgeting among patients not only translates into being burdensome but also trickles down to pressurizing the whole medical fraternity unnecessarily. (Dietrich & Anderson, 2012). For instance, going for unnecessarily very expensive treatment on minor ailments not only means poor ways of spending but also denies other deserving patients a chance to receive the treatment they deserve. The idea behind this is the economical argument when the demand of goods or services goes high, then their prices are also bound to rise. As such, the public needs to be advised and trained on how best they can spend on medication to ensure that they do not overspend unnecessarily. (Gruen & Howarth, 2005). In addition to this, the medical providers and other people involved in managing finances need to be thoroughly trained on how to go about in order to have the best bargain in the health market as far as spending and investing in medication is concerned. In order to achieve this, there is need to have sound policies in place that advocate for and give the right direction on how this can be carried out. The healthcare providers also need to be well taken care of in order to ensure that the system runs well. Many at times, there have been complaints and even go-slows on the side of health workers mainly in disagreement of the way they are treated and remunerated while at work. As this happens, many get weary and get tempted to touch the funds that are meant to support the running of the healthcare facilities. (Chawla, 2007). Many, when caught end up being victimized oblivious of the fact that there is a lot that they are in need of that is driving them into acting so unscrupulously. (Buchbinder & Shanks, 2011). With this in mind, there is therefore the need to have a fairly generous remuneration system and moralizing working standards that will allow all the health workers to feel at home always while at work. Additionally, health facilities can adopt smart ways of handling cash and other related effects that can be a subject of compromised accountability. (Gruen & Howarth, 2005). The heavy growth in technology has facilitated different smart and reliable ways of carrying out business without necessarily having to go the manual way. In addition to this, there are so many enhancements in the system that can facilitate handling of numerous tasks at ago while keeping security, accuracy and audit trails as intact as is desired. (Gruen & Howarth, 2005). There are a number of examples to this. Firstly, the use of smart cards facilitates numerous transactions and saves on time and transaction costs. Another example is the use of e-procurement systems where orders and purchases can be made in a stress free way. In ensuring accountability, the accuracy and the robust audit trail systems that are ingrained in this kind of business platform can assist in establishing say a misappropriation, a fraud, corruption, inaccuracies and many other undesirable outcomes of financial management within the health sector. At the moment, although many health care units are implementing their usage, it still remains at their own discretion. (Gruen & Howarth, 2005). This should be therefore encouraged through sound policies that will facilitate the adoption of such platforms within the health sectors. In addition to being efficient, the cost of operation among hospitals can go down by eliminating the need for human services such as statisticians, auditors, cashiers and purchasing officers since the intelligence of the system is able to facilitate the accomplishment of their roles from end to end. (Gruen & Howarth, 2005). Another way through which sound management of finance within the health sector can be achieved is through ethical emphases. (Chawla, 2007). It is only when ethics are embraced and ingrained within people’s hearts that things can move smoothly without any problem. Cases of corruption and fraud are commonplace not only within the health sector but also in other areas. (Chawla, 2007). Theft of healthcare funds, equipment and misappropriation of resources meant for easing the burden of healthcare are not new vices in the field of health. As such, there is need to have a population of healthcare stakeholders that are at the helm of protecting the integrity of the profession as far as financial management is concerned. (Buchbinder & Shanks, 2011). In order to have such people in place, there is need for persistently imparting techniques on how these vices can be checked and dealt with when they appear. The above illustrated ways are mainly proactive since they all carry with them at least an initiative on how to prevent the financial management problems from occurring. However, a good system should not only be protective but also reactive when the problems trickle through the defence system that there is. As such, reactive ways also need to be explored as far as efficiency within financial management and accountability are concerned. To begin with, there should be a robust risk management system in place that can help to bring into light all risky activities that can compromise the way financial management is supposed to be done. This will help to identify, reveal and seal all the gaps that can facilitate misappropriation of funds. (Dietrich & Anderson, 2012). Auditing has been one of the most acclaimed ways of ensuring that the management remains compliant to the policies in place. (Dietrich & Anderson, 2012). However, even the institutions that are ever audited still appear in scandals of financial misuse. Given this, there is need to re-look at what auditing standards, procedures and how they are implemented and enhance them further in order to ensure that auditing completely seals the menace of poor financial management and misappropriation. (Buchbinder & Shanks, 2011). Another step that can be taken is collaborating with the existing supreme law while formulating financial management policies within the healthcare fraternity. As much as there are flaws that are identified within the healthcare units, some of them go untouched since the existing laws are not capable of dealing with the issues as they arise. (Chawla, 2007). This is mainly because of the inconsistencies that exist between the health care policies and the existing laws. Given this, there is need to align the policies to the superior laws in place so that there is surety of a good support system in place to take of irregularities that may arise in the financial systems within the health care fraternity. (Chawla, 2007). In addition to this, there should be constant reporting and accountability forums where the key stakeholders are tasked with explaining how funds have been used in meeting the healthcare needs. This is not mainly for the purpose of finding fault in the management but also identifying areas where there are problems that need to be addressed, such as shortage of funds that are needed to meet the ever growing healthcare needs. (Gruen & Howarth, 2005). This can be done before the eyes of the public and questions allowed on areas where there is no clarity. With such an initiative in place, all the stakeholders will be forced to keep their eyes open throughout while dealing with financial matters. (Dietrich & Anderson, 2012). This however cannot be possible if the existing policies are not articulate enough to deal with these problems. As such all the amendments and even new policies that come up within the healthcare systems should therefore give provision of public accountability to the public. Having looked at the above propositions, it is also important to highlight a few factors that prevent the realization of elaborate policies as far as financial management within the healthcare fraternity is concerned. Firstly, lack of the willingness to implement such propositions from the stakeholders has always been an impediment. (Chawla, 2007). Some of the policies are ignored mainly because of the trouble that one would have to go through in implementing them since there is a lot of initial work involved. As such, policies can be created but left to lie untouched because of this. This in turn leaves the country where it was before the policies were drafted. In addition to this, the costs involved in implementing such policies may not be within the budget, hence an impediment. (Chawla, 2007). For instance, the proposition that healthcare remuneration should be generously implemented might have an implication on the health of the In conclusion, healthcare remains one of the priorities to all citizens of any country and therefore all should be done to ensure that the health standards are not compromised. As has been seen, financial management is the cornerstone of either the success or failure of any healthcare system within a country. The implication of this, as has been discussed is that the way finances are managed plays a key role on how well the patients are taken care of. The identified ways are only but a few and they are not a limit to a further exposition. References Buchbinder, S. B., & Shanks, N. H. (2011). Introduction to Health Care Management. London: Jones & Bartlett Publishers. Chawla, M. (2007). Health Care Spending in the New EU Member States:. Washington D.C.: World Bank Publications. Dietrich, M., & Anderson, G. (2012). The Financial Professional's Guide to Healthcare Reform. Hoboken: John Wiley and Sons. Gruen, R., & Howarth, A. (2005). Managing Health Services Finance. Berkshire: McGraw-Hill Internationa. Read More