Stakeholders In Healthcare

Stakeholders Compare and Contrast Essay

American healthcare is expensive, technical, and prone to error. Further, many Americans lack access to care, and therefore do not have ability to have their chronic diseases managed. Many ideas have been posed to solve these problems. However, not many people have stepped up to implement the real change that is required to bring about cost containment, quality care, and accessibility. High quality care addresses the conflicts found in healthcare, and provides a well-structured, and efficient delivery system.

Stakeholders

One reason that such a challenge exists in providing quality care is the differing perspectives of the stakeholders. Put another way, each stakeholder group is very passionate about

However, in modern times hospitals are finding themselves experiencing financial pressure. This pressure is manifest through payers who are paying a flat fee for services, or procedures (Grand Canyon University, 2010). As a result, many hospitals find themselves specializing in procedures. This is where one may hear a hospital advertised as a stroke center, or a cardiac center. These hospitals have chosen to focus their care in a specific procedure centric venue in order to maximize profit. In particular, a hospital who specializes in cardiac management can keep costs down by managing their resources, contracting with vendors, and only offering specific types of cardiac equipment, and attracting physicians willing to work in this construct.

Payer

Payers, also known as insurance companies, are often seen as the bullies in healthcare. The payers work hard to contain costs (Grand Canyon University, 2010). This is a difficult task when you have physicians who want to work unhindered. Hospitals want to provide as many services as possible to their community, and keep ahead of the competition. Yet, employers are complaining because of rising premiums. There is much work to be done in order for the payer to meet the needs of the patient, while holding costs down, and providing safe, quality care.

While the ACA provides benefit to the community by providing care for more individuals, it also creates stress on a system that is not working in concert, and in fact in many ways is disjointed. What is the answer to bringing more care to more individuals, while providing value for that care? The answer seems to lie in meeting the needs of the community as this stakeholder is representative of the whole.

The Institute of Medicine (US) Roundtable on Value & Science-Driven Health Care (2010), begins to address this issue of value which is what is ultimately creating conflict amongst the stakeholder groups. For instance, different stakeholders have different definitions for value as described earlier. These values collide and create conflict. All of these values, combined with growing numbers of patient populations create conflict that must be