RTT1 Task 2 Jake McKee Western Governors University RTT1 Task 2 Root Cause Analysis (RCA) that led to sentinel event Root cause in this scenario appears to be a combination of things. Most significantly, staff did not safely adjust to rapidly increasing demands of their patient acuity and census. The infrastructure did not allow simultaneous monitoring of two patients in crisis. The department is at high risk of inundation, being staffed with only one RN and one LPN, one secretary, and one emergency department physician. Secondly, balance in the monitoring of high-risk patients was inadequate.
With the unemployment rates so high; more and more Americans have to go on a government funded plan. These plans are very time consuming for the doctors which again takes away from patient care time. Yes, the incentives were out of hand before with the drug companies, but now the regulations for such are very strict and very limited, why can’t we find a happy medium. Now, with the healthcare reform benefits, premiums, and services covered will be a lot worse. Guidelines and limitations on prescriptions, tests, and specialists will be even more stringent.
Their backlog of policy requests (WIPs) for said week is 82 and the number of new policies and endorsements do not seem to be generating as much revenue as in the past. As pricing and commission differences among insurance firms have narrowed, agents have increasingly made referrals based on customer service (i.e. quick TAT). Fruitvale’s backlog and TAT indicate the presence of a bottleneck which is resulting in idle time for some employees while overburdening others. Moreover, they are losing renewal business to competitors while trying to keep their employees, especially the senior underwriters with many years of experience, from going to Golden Gate.
This is an important issue due to the fact that biotechnology is heavily affected by capital availability and recently, venture capitalists were reluctant to fund biotechnology firms. As Jeff Hirst said, “When it comes to raising capital today, it’s a buyers’ market.” Therefore, producing returns for our current investors and producing high returns for potential buyers was a key focus. A second key issue was the probability of successfully completing each phase of testing. For both Phase I/II and Phase III, if the phase was not completed, there would be zero sales and all capital expenditures would be rendered useless. Phase I/II seemed relatively routine; however, Phase III was much more complex and presented a much bigger risk of preventing FDA approval and eliminating all future sales.
Unfortunately, there are several indicators of project failure within the organization. For example, Memorial’s objective is to significantly reduce the amount of medical errors by installing an enterprise-wide CPOE system. However, from the onset of the project, there was no time to properly plan or budget. Memorial might have an appealing vision for the future, but its strategy and implementation process is sorely lacking. Another indicator of Memorial’s project failure regards insufficient leadership support.
Wal-Mart’s sales were growing, and that meant that Target’s sales would go down since consumers preferred Wal-Mart for Target. The inability of Target’s managers to identify a solution to the problem of dropping sales and develop a viable course of action also affected Target’s performance. Another micro environmental factor was the thriftiness of customers all over America, which endeared them to Wal-Mart. The impatience of Target’s shareholders and the pressure they exerted on the company’s board to deliver was also a major factor. The marketing strategies that were adopted by the management also failed to turn things around.
Development of new drugs and getting them to market is critical for remaining competitive in the pharmaceutical industry. The final option I see for Merck in this situation is to create new capabilities through a spinout organization. As it stands, Merck is unprepared (with its current competencies) to rapidly move into the pharmacy management arena. This is primarily due to the fact that most of their resources are devoted to drug research and development. Spinout organizations, however, should primarily be used when a separate organization is required because the
Patients who were admitted came to the hospitals much sicker, and you had more folks to care for at the same time, with less help. This was not fair to you or those in your care. Conclusion Managed care was born out of a good idea, basically to help curb the rising cost of health care. In essence it should have been the answer. But because of the greediness of some just as in other models what started out as good ended up not being able to provide the quality care at an affordable price like was promised.
Recently growth has been restricted, due in part to recent fines from state and government agencies for poorly kept records for both clients and employees. Recently APremium has not been able to respond to the staffing demands of the newer clients in remote regions, their employee lists have become overwhelming and very difficult to filter through in time to be useful in responding to staffing deficiencies on short notice. The field staff has been complaining that payroll is always late and many of the skilled laborers are threatening to leave. APremium is seeking another contract with a very delicate group of clients who require premium care and attention to code. This contract can increase their business by 75%.
Other companies, particularly small employers, have eliminated health benefits entirely. Employees’ pay raises have not kept pace with the increased burden of these cost-sharing efforts. Consumers are increasingly postponing or foregoing medical treatment due to lack of sufficient