Introduction
Quality improvement is an important strategy in nursing, as it helps in improving the quality of life and the treatment outcomes. This paper seeks to show that hypertension control is an effective quality improvement initiative that will result in benefits for everyone in the medical field.
Purpose
The initiative will result in better methods of controlling hypertension. The initiative will involve the use of network treatment. It will entail using different professionals in the hospital to improve hypertension treatment. Thus, the organization will not have to spend funds in establishing new treatment facilities. The project will also necessitate the use of records to determine the best methods of controlling hypertension. Therefore, the initiative will be able to come up with a new hypertension treatment strategy that will be cost effective and improve outcomes for the patients (Huber, 2014).
Target Population
The target population for the quality control initiative will be patients who are at the risk of hypertension. It includes pregnant women, patients on dialysis, and adults who make up a large number of patients with hypertension (Meleis, 2012). Through the initiative, it will be easier to deal with the condition and come up with ways of treating and preventing recurrence of hypertension. It will result in general improvements in health and make it cheaper for the patients to use medical services. Patients and physicians will be closely involved in the program. The data needed to determine the hypertension control initiative will require the input of physicians to ascertain which methods will be more effective and result in increased rates of patient recovery. The data collected will be a reflection of the quality of service provided by the hospital.
The initiative also involves all practitioners who deal with hypertension patients in the hospital. The practitioners will be placed into three groups in order to determine the effectiveness of using clinical pharmacists, instead of just physicians and nurses. The first group will deal with ordinary care of hypertension patients. The second group will be involved in gaining knowledge from the pharmacist about the best ways to deal with hypertension. The third group will be directly involved with the pharmacist in providing medical care to the hypertension patients (Black & Chitty, 2014). Data from these three groups will be analyzed to track the effectiveness of the initiative.
Benefits
Both patients and physicians will benefit from the quality improvement program as a result of quality control mechanisms involving the use of different professionals and collection of data to determine the improvements. Physicians will be able to offer effective treatment options to patients, thereby reducing the workload. The registry will also act as a means of feedback about the effectiveness of the system. It will act as a means of tracing the work of the physicians and determining patient satisfaction (Meleis, 2012). This will result in a profitable organization, as it will increase its effectiveness and attract more patients. The strategy will also improve the general health care costs. Therefore, the hospital will attract more patients.
Budget
The costs for the project will have a minimal effect on the organization. The returns expected from funding the project are far higher than the costs of funding. The funding used will be required to initialize the development of quality control mechanisms for hypertension. This will mean changing the way hypertension is managed with new methods that have far higher positive patient outcomes. Moreover, their effectiveness will result in improved health outcomes for patients. For instance, the money can be used for the purchase of medication recommended by the pharmacist for treating hypertension and acquiring clinical pharmacists with the knowledge of diverse cases of hypertension.
Evaluation
The evaluation of the program will involve collection of data and questioning the patients about their experiences. Through evaluation, it will be possible to determine how the patients have gained from the system. The data to be collected will start from the beginning of the initiative. The measures will include quality of life, provider satisfaction, and clinical parameters, such as patient history. Analysis of the data will be vital in finding areas that need improvement and tracing the developments from various patient care strategies (Black & Chitty, 2014). Problems may arise along the way. For instance, doctors may be pessimistic that the data will not reflect the quality of their service. Some diseases are a natural occurrence and depend on many factors to be treated. Therefore, a doctor may have done his best with the resources they have, but still gets far worse outcomes than expected. Therefore, it will be important to determine the patient history so that the initiative can rely on various factors that can determine its effectiveness.
The management will conduct the evaluations. The initiative will require teamwork, whereby different members of the medical teams, in this case doctors and pharmacists will work together. Therefore, the management will be able to determine the improvements arising from the relationships.
Conclusion
In conclusion, hypertension control is an important initiative. This will entail looking for ways to improve the quality of hypertension treatments offered by the organization and patient outcomes. In this case, encouraging a closer interaction between physician and pharmacists will prove effective, as their knowledge will be vital in determining the best ways to treat patients, resulting in better rates of satisfaction. Therefore, the application of the hypertension initiative will be beneficial to the patients, providers, and the board of directors.
References
Black, B. P., & Chitty, K. K. (2014). Professional nursing: Concepts & challenges. St. Louis, MO: Elsevier.
Huber, D. L. (2014). Leadership & nursing care management. Maryland Heights, MO: Saunders Elsevier.
Meleis, A. I. (2012). Theoretical nursing: Ddevelopment and progress. Philadelphia, PA: Wolters Kluwer Health/Lippincott Williams & Wilkins.