Proposed Strategies to Improve the Quality of Care, Enhance Patient Safety, and Reduce Costs to the System and Individual

The application of telehealth technology in care delivery is a proposed strategy that can improve the quality of care, enhance patient safety, and reduce care costs to the system and the individual. Telehealth allows for the remote delivery of care services as well as the monitoring and management of patients remotely. Heart disease patients have an increased demand for care services, which increases the costs of care to both the patient and the system in several ways. For instance, the need to provide collaborative interdisciplinary care to a heart disease patient can lead to a shortage of care providers within a particular care setting. This can increase costs and risk patient safety in terms of traveling expenses, reimbursements for a large care team, the time taken to respond to complications and emergencies, and the lack of continuous changes in patient’s health. However, the use of telehealth eliminates the need to travel, supports remote care delivery and interdisciplinary collaboration to deliver care, and supports the continuity of care and disease management in outpatient settings (Khera et al., 2020). Available resources for benchmark data on care quality, patient safety, and costs to the system and individuals related to heart disease include targeted surveys, administrative and medical records, claims data, surveillance data, disease registries, standardized patient assessments, and peer-reviewed literature.

Conclusion

Heart disease is a leading threat to public health due to its prevalence, high mortality rates, and impact on the quality of care and quality of life for patients. It also increases the costs of care at the individual and system levels. Nursing standards and policies guide nurse practices in the management of heart diseases. Therefore, it is important for nursing boards and government policies to make necessary practice revisions that improve the availability of healthcare professionals to support access to care services and improve the costs, safety, and quality of care. Additionally, the application of technologies such as telehealth in patient monitoring and rehabilitation can improve the quality of care, enhance patient safety, and reduce care costs.

References

American Association of Nurse Practitioners. (2022). COVID-19 State Emergency Response: Temporarily Suspended and Waived Practice Agreement Requirements. https://www.aanp.org/advocacy/state/covid-19-state-emergency-response-temporarily-suspended-and-waived-practice-agreement-requirements