Importance of Each Rate-Based Measure to a Chosen Clinical Organization and Setting

All healthcare organizations have a moral and legal obligation to promote healthy living in the populace. Besides the usual diagnosis and treatment of illnesses, it is crucial to build lasting patient-provider relationships and adopt mechanisms for enhancing the quality, safety, and timeliness of care. Saint Joseph Hospital, Denver, is among clinical organizations providing primary and specialized care. In primary care, Saint Joseph Hospital’s fundamental principle is that the organization’s primary care providers are the first people that patients visit for their health questions and concerns (SLC Health Saint Joseph, 2021). Advanced care in Saint Joseph Hospital includes heart and vascular care, orthopedics, and emergency.

As a rate-based measure, the readmission rate is crucial at Saint Joseph Hospital as an indicator of the quality of care that patients receive. Gupta et al. (2019) described hospital readmission within 30 days as a significant quality measure since it represents a potentially preventable adverse outcome. With Saint Joseph Hospital engaging in complex procedures such as heart surgery, cardiac rehabilitation, and heart arrhythmia treatment, the chances of readmissions might be high in such settings. Brunner-La Rocca et al. (2020) observed that the readmission rate is high in advanced care such as cardiovascular health procedures. As a result, Saint Joseph’s management should use the readmission rate as a motivation to improve quality outcomes. The rates indicate the magnitude of effort required to achieve the desired level of patient satisfaction.

Like other clinical settings, Saint Joseph Hospital should apply evidence-based practice strategies to improve clinical outcomes. Its primary, emergency and acute care outcomes should match the required performance benchmarks at local, state, and national levels. Achieving this critical goal requires Saint Joseph Hospital to collect data and measure performance on significant outcome areas. Accordingly, complication rates indicate areas that need more intervention as far as the quality of care is concerned. For instance, shock, hemorrhage, urinary retention, and pulmonary embolism are common complications after surgeries. Since they are costly to manage and extend hospital stays, measuring their rates is crucial always. The rate indicates the extent and type of responses required to ensure that Saint Joseph Hospital provides care that meets all the quality standards.

As a measure of care quality, the post-procedure death rate is also crucial to Saint Joseph’s Hospital in decision making and resource allocation. From a general operation viewpoint, healthcare organizations must reduce mortality rates as low as possible. The goal should be conducting procedures associated with zero deaths. Like in readmission and complication rates, post-procedure death rates indicate the areas of attention requiring improvement to reduce mortality rates. For instance, deaths associated with health complications can be prevented by increasing or improving interventions that reduce complications. Deaths associated with home-based care after surgeries can be prevented by improving home-based care.

Organization Information

• Briefly describe the health information technology system/application and the organization type (hospital, clinic, public health agency, health care software company, government health information website, private virtual health information site, etc.).
• Is the health information technology system/application clinical, administrative, educational, or research related?
• What were the key reasons for the development of this health information technology system/application, i.e., what made the organization believe this system/application was needed? How did this organization determine those needs? Did the organization use specific tools to conduct needs assessments, staff opinions, or workflows?
• How did the organization determine that this specific system/application could fulfill its predetermined needs?
• Who manages this health information technology system/application and where are they located within the organization’s administrative structure?

Information System Application Design and Development

• Many health care systems have multiple independent entities that work together toward the common goal of providing high-quality care. How did—and do—the various stakeholders make decisions related to this health information technology system/application? Were the end users involved in the development of this health information technology system/application?
• How are individuals trained to use the health information technology s