Healthy People 2020 Essay

Health care professionals have always been striving for higher standards of individual health in the healthcare industry. The US is globally known for providing the best health care possible, regardless of nationality. Their providence of healthcare in the US does not stop at the doors of hospitals, rather it goes beyond to its research of identifying the microorganisms, making of vaccine, and developing a line of drugs with fewer adverse affects. In order to achieve these goals, the US government has provided immense support by sanctioning grants and hiring brilliant minds to work toward a common goal. Healthy People 2020 (2014) was developed to further the research in eradicating health problems by identifying goals for next the 10 years.

It “reflects the commitment by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) to preventing HAIs” (Healthy People 2020, 2014, para. #4). Healthy People 2020’s goals are to prevent morbidity, and prevail well-being by decreasing disease. Most common types of healthcare-associated infections (HAIs) identified by the Health People 2020 (2014) website include “catheter-associated urinary tract infections, surgical site infections, bloodstream infections, pneumonia and clostridium difficile” (2014, para. #6). However, the health care industry faces many challenges; one of them being an increased costs caused by previously mentioned invasive procedures and devices used in medical procedures (Healthy People 2020, 2014). Through Healthy People, the US government works to educate people about preventative care and provides extensive research for health care professionals regarding improvement in techniques of certain medical procedures along with their

Furthermore, this makes them an ideal population which demonstrates vulnerable immune system and prone to ward off infections with much weaker internal defense system available to them. These patients are already exposed to different types of commensals inside and out of their bodies. This makes it extremely important for ICU caregivers to follow strict procedure/checklist so that external bacteria will not infiltrate through invasive central line-catheter. This also helps reduce stress on patients and costs on