Joint Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Operations - Essay Example

Chapter One
Problems
Introduction
Around 89.9 million Americans sought medical attention in hospital emergency rooms in 1992 alone. Given the population of the United States, that meant 357 out of every 1,000 people being treated (Nelson & Stassman, 1994, pg. 5) and 762 million visits to primary care physicians (Hall & Owing, 1994, pg. 158) annually. Checking into any hospital, although often a stressful event, is a relatively routine occurrence laced with the assumption that quality health goes hand in hand with a visit to a healthcare provider. It is not until one experiences or reads about terrible healthcare tragedies that questions regarding its quality are voiced. If unchecked, such shortfalls can remain undetected as it is not always a major catastrophic, highly visible problem that affects a patient’s safety while hospitalized. The responsibility to detect potential problems and solve them before a tragedy occurs is a responsibility of all three – the health care providers, an informed patient, and the Joint Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Operations (JCAHO).

Prior to 1951, there was no standardized method to analyze performance in medical facilities within the United States. Patients routinely checked in and out of the hospital, but no organization had established measurable criteria to evaluate the quality of service a patient received. More frightening, the lack of data collection and analysis of information left a huge void in uncovering problematic, recurring problems. Often within individual medical facilities, problems, if noted, tended to be hushed up. If they were dealt with, at all, it was generally only a cursory, case-specific examination to appease the given situation and no fundamental procedural changes were made to eliminate future occurrences. Since JCAHO began doing Announced Surveys in hospitals, quality of service has become a vital part of any medical facility. This may be partly attributed to the visibility that is placed on the assessment process, but that is not the sole reason. Quality in medication, just like technological advancements, has become a major focus of modern health service organizations. Through standardized evaluations of methodology; data collection; analysis of that data to determine root causes; and implementation of corrective measures countless errors, complications, and unnecessary deaths can be avoided. Although it is impossible to eliminate all errors, eliminating what is avoidable will make health care safer for all of us. Further, sharing of problems discovered in one facility could prevent a similar tragedy in another. Likewise, best practices found, when published and shared lead to better healthcare for everyone. Communication is vital in the move to quality within any healthcare facility.