Strengths And Weaknesses Of The Healthcare System

1. Safe: avoiding injuries to patients from care that is intended to help them, reducing medical errors.

Safety is the vital foundation of the healthcare system. Making sure patients are not victims of human errors while caring form them. Safety is what people think of when it comes to quality improvement. It refers to the treatment given in healthcare setting does not harm patients. Unfortunately, humans are not perfect and errors are made. In order to provide safe care, it is required from everyone to be involved in identifying opportunities where patient care can be made safer. Constant learning and proven based evidence are necessary to the improve care and prevent harm. There are many ways to prevent errors and cue staff before or while providing care in a medical setting, such as, doctor’s offices, hospital, nursing homes, or rehabilitation facilities. For example, making sure that medications are labeled, providing correct dose to correct patient. Making sure bed rails and

Simply stated by the IOM, the “purpose of the health system is to continually reduce the burden of illness, injury, and disability, and to improve the health and functioning of the people of the United States.” The focus of this Aim is that these benefits of the healthcare system should be available to all. In my research on this particular aim, I was surprised to find that the Institute for Healthcare Improvement considers this aim, one of the most painful weaknesses of the health care system is its failure to provide care of equal quality to everyone, regardless of race, age, gender, ethnicity, income, geographic location, or any other demographic detail. That’s why equity is one of the “Aims for Improvement” in the Institute of Medicine’s 2001 report, Crossing the Quality Chasm: A New Health System for the 21st Century, which describes the immense divide between what we know to be good health care and the health care that people actually