Managing Stakeholders in Healthcare

Stakeholders and their responsibilities in the healthcare industry exist in a broad range that extends from within the industry to the community at large. Patients, communities, governments, providers, payors, and researchers are some of the many stakeholder groups that have an important role to play in the U.S. healthcare system. As a health services manager, your role within the health care industry continues to bring innovation to the continuum of care. Watch “Managed Care in Healthcare” to gain real-world insight about communicating in the healthcare field.

One of the important stakeholders in the healthcare system selected for the research is physicians who are the providers of care to the receivers which are patients. Their major role is to collaborate with healthcare providers to manage and maintain care for patients across the continuum of care in both inpatient and outpatient settings. The emerging role selected for the research is of a lifestyle medicine physician who is responsible for planning, evaluating, and monitoring a patient’s lifestyle choices such as sleep, nutrition, stress levels, and the ability to interact with others. Their role is important because lifestyle factors drive 80% of chronic illnesses which would drop healthcare expenditures (Pere, 2017). Their role is becoming increasingly significant in the healthcare industry because of the growing prevalence of chronic illnesses caused due to lifestyle factors. I think that this role will change the future of healthcare because it has shifted the focus from treating illnesses to preventing them and promoting overall health. Thus, investing in the role of a lifestyle medicine physician can be a smart choice that patients can make to prevent themselves from chronic diseases.

How is stakeholder defined? It is interesting to review the dictionary definition versus how the literature defines the meaning of a stakeholder.

1. According to the dictionary, a stakeholder is an individual who owns a share and has responsibilities towards a business or organization and therefore owns an interest in its success. In literature, a stakeholder is an individual who can affect an organization’s activities and has an interest in the outcomes and achievements of the organization. They are the individuals upon whom the business or organization relies to achieve its own objective for sustaining success (McGrath & Whitty, 2017).
2. Access to care is essential because it ensures that all individuals have full access to the continuum of quality care services they need. It involves the full range of essential services of healthcare from treatment and prevention of diseases to promotion, rehabilitation, and palliative care of healthcare services. Quality of care is another important aspect that refers to the degree to which care services for people increase the likelihood of desired health outcomes.

References

McGrath, S. K., & Whitty, S. J. (2017). Stakeholder defined. International Journal of Managing Projects in Business, 10(4), 721–748.

Pere, D. (2017). Building physician competency in lifestyle medicine: A model for health improvement. American Journal of Preventive Medicine, 52(2), 260–261.