Applying the conceot of Positive Deviance - Article Example

Applying the Concept of Positive Deviance: Positive deviance (PD) can be used as a unique approach to plummet down the level of hospital acquired infections. Healthcare acquired infections (HAI) form a big healthcare problem of staggering importance. PD can be used to identify individuals who bring better outcomes in same circumstances under which their peers could not demonstrate any success. One of my close friend’s family member recently got admitted to the ICU following a brutal heart attack.

He survived the heart attack due to timely medical help, but died soon afterwards as a result of septic shock. The patient developed septic shock after contracting an HAI called MRSA (methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus). Tragic demise of my friend’s relative was an event which was preventable, but it happened because more attention was laid on treatment and less on prevention. Lack of awareness regarding HIAs is also a big problem. The need of the time is to use a different approach to handle the growing problem of HIAs as current approaches have had poor success in terms of outcomes.

We need to bring in the method of PD to identify those individuals or positive deviants who are present in every community and who use unconventional practices or behaviors to successfully solve even the most intractable problems (Bradley et al., 2009). Such individuals offer better solutions than their peers who remain unsuccessful even while having access to same kind of resources. This is why PD is popularized as “a refreshing theory for social change” (Pascale et al., cited in Sellnow & Seeger, 2013).

In order to prevent HIAs and address this grave healthcare issue, strategic initiatives should be taken based on introducing and promoting new behaviors till they transform into permanent habits and creating sustainable change. Research claims that one of the biggest hurdles in the way of PD is to get large numbers of people to quickly embrace a desired behavioral change (Seidman & McCauley, 2009, p. 27). Any behavioral change should be slowly “communicated over time among members of a social system” (Rogers, cited in Dingfelder & Mandell, 2011).

This is called the process of diffusion. In case of HIAs, we should especially remember the famous awareness iceberg according to which crisis in the form of untimely death occurs because there is lack of awareness regarding the intensity of the issue in hospitals. Only 4% problems are visible or known to top managers. Remaining problems remain hidden under the water (Gardam, 2009). Research identifies an established relationship between PD and MRSA as following implementation of PD, 26‐62% reduction was reported in MRSA clinical infections (Gardam, 2009).

Also, in case of malnutrition among Vietnamese children, using a PD approach reduced this problem by 75% (Bradley et al., 2009). Certain strategies were shown to the villagers to solve the malnutrition issue themselves. These villagers were named positive deviants (Pascale, Sternin, & Sternin, 2013). PD can be made to work in hospitals where HIA poses a big threat by reinventing the wheel and getting the right kind of decision-makers around the table. Also, everybody should be encouraged to join in on the process because sometimes “’unusual suspects’ join and take unexpected leadership roles” (Gardam, 2009).

References: Bradley, E.H., Curry, L.A., Ramanadhan, S., Rowe, L., Nembhard, I.M., & Krumholz, H.M. (2009). Research in action: Using positive deviance to improve quality of health care. Implementation Science, 4(25). doi:10.1186/1748-5908-4-25Dingfelder, H.E., & Mandell, D.S. (2011). Bridging the research-to-practice gap in autism intervention: An application of diffusion of innovation theory. Journal of Autism & Developmental Disorders, 41(5), 597-609. doi: 10.1007/s10803-010-1081-0Gardam, M. (2009). Positive Deviance: A Culture Change Management Approach to Reducing Health Care Acquired Infections.

Retrieved from http://www.positivedeviance.org/resources/cpsi-pd-webinar-june-09.pdfPascale, R., Sternin, J., & Sternin, M. (2013). The Power of Positive Deviance: How Unlikely Innovators Solve the World’s Toughest Problems. Harvard Business Press.Seidman, W., & McCauley, M. (2009). A Scientific Model for Grassroots O.D. Organization Development Journal, 27(2), 27-37.Sellnow, T.L., & Seeger, M.W. (2013). Theorizing Crisis Communication. John Wiley & Sons.