The Three Faces Of Performance Management

Abstract

In contemporary society, the health care system is facing difficulties in providing an efficient measurement system for quality medical care. Medical institutions essentially require a proper measurement system for providing high-quality medical care to their patients. The public has become more demanding and particular regarding the medical care provided to them because of high healthcare expenditures and technological innovations. Therefore, the demand for performance measurement is progressing. The health care institutions are working on performance improvement/ quality improvement, accountability, and significant research in the healthcare system to provide quality medical care. These three faces of performance measurements have different approaches and data tools to implement in the health care system. Healthcare professionals use these performance measurements to provide efficient medical care outcomes and results. Though these performance measurements are distinctive in nature, the main objective is to provide efficient medical care.

Introduction

In the modern world, performance measurement plays a significant role in the health care system. In the health care system, medical treatments have become immensely costly. This is the reason that people getting medical care are demanding high efficiency in performance measurements in healthcare institutions. According to research, healthcare performance measurements are based on “Quality and efficiency of patient care, Cost of healthcare services, Disparities in performance, and Care outcomes”(The Three Faces of Performance Measurement, n.d.).The payers and purchasers of healthcare institutions require quality medical care. To provide quality and efficient medical care to people, healthcare institutions require performance measurements. The three significant foundations of performance measurement are “Improvement”, “Accountability” and “Research”. (Loeb, 2004). This research paper analyzes the role of three facets of performance measurement in the healthcare system in providing quality healthcare.

Improvement

The healthcare industry is working in their respective fields to advocate quality improvement and provide quality healthcare in terms of cost and quality medical care. The health care institutions are working to provide “Continuous Quality Improvement (CQI)” for patients in every medical care facility (Lloyd, 2004). The healthcare sector works on the “voice of the customer (VOC)”. Improvement in the health care system aims to provide efficiency and effectiveness in medical care to patients. (Smith et al., n.d.)

For instance, medical institutions are improving their quality by including technological innovations to provide quality medical care to their patients. These medical improvements involve outpatient medical services. It also involves online medical appointments, mobile vans for ambulatory care, along with home-based medical/ support services. All of these innovations involve the struggles of the healthcare industry to improve itself to provide quality medical care.

Accountability 

The paradigm of accountability plays a significant role in the healthcare system. Healthcare institutions require “public accountability and quality data” (The Three Faces of Performance Measurement, n.d.) to elucidate improvement and innovations in providing medical care to people. The paradigm of accountability in the measurement system revolves around comparative judgments, choices, reassurance, and motivation for change. The measurement data collected from the paradigm of accountability involve the outcomes and results of the medical treatments. The data collected from the outcomes and results can be from complications, mortality rates, health costs, etc. The data must be valid, precise, and reliable and used for accountability.

As healthcare expenditures have risen tremendously, healthcare performance measurement is essentially required (R. Lloyd, 2017). Healthcare accountability mechanisms play a significant role in healthcare institutions. Healthcare professionals use measurement data from accountability to make medical decisions for positive and improved outcomes. The measurement data of the subjects used is public. Healthcare professionals use public data and analyze it to ensure their desired outcomes. Furthermore, healthcare institutions use accountability data to make comparisons and decisions for better and improved outcomes.

Research 

In contemporary society, just like every field, the healthcare system requires research and exploration to improve healthcare facilities and patient care. The research conducted in the modern era must have practical implications in the healthcare system. Scientists and healthcare practitioners investigate different healthcare paradigms to gain new knowledge without any biased motive. The data of the individual subjects used in the research is highly confidential.

Healthcare practitioners and scientists take large sample sizes from complex processes and evaluate generalizable and universal results. The research conducted by the scientists elucidates massive innovations in medical institutions. The innovations introduced by research and exploration in the healthcare system include online medical care facilities, online appointments with doctors (live video sessions), radioactive/ laser treatments, laparoscopy, etc.

Improvement, Accountability, & Research: Mutual Association 

The health care system requires efficient performance measurement to provide quality medical care. The three significant components of medical care are pre-service, point-of-service, and post-service. The three faces of performance measurement play a significant role in providing quality. Though these performance measurements have many differences, there is an inevitable association between improvement, accountability, and research. These performance measurements cannot work exclusively. The main purpose of these measurements is to provide quality health care. Therefore, the measurement system requires all types of data from these three performance measurement faces to provide quality medical care. These three paradigms work together to provide quality medical care to people.

Conclusion

The fundamental objective of the health care system is to provide efficient and improved medical care to patients and the public. The three approaches of performance measurement are immensely based on the clinical outcomes of the patients. Though these three approaches are distinctive in nature, however, they have an unavoidable association. All healthcare institutions must have the foundation of an efficient measurement system. Healthcare professionals require the implementation of these three faces of performance measurement.

References

Lloyd, R. (2017). Quality Health Care: A Guide to Developing and Using Indicators (2nd edition). Jones & Bartlett Learning.

Lloyd, R. C. (2004). Quality Health Care: A Guide to Developing and Using Indicators. Jones & Bartlett Learning.

Loeb, J. M. (2004). The current state of performance measurement in health care. International Journal for Quality in Health Care: Journal of the International Society for Quality in Health Care, 16 Suppl 1, i5-9. https://doi.org/10.1093/intqhc/mzh007

Smith, P. C., Mossialos, E., & Papanicolas, I. (n.d.). Performance measurement for health system improvement: Experiences, challenges and prospects. 28.

The three faces of performance measurement: Improvement, accountability, and research | IHI – Institute for Healthcare Improvement. (n.d.). Retrieved October 23, 2021, from http://www.ihi.org:80/resources/Pages/Publications/Thethreefacesofperformancemeasurement

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