Running head: WEEK TWO ASSIGNMENT

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Week Two Assignment
Antdrone R. Randolph

BUS 644 Operations Management

Ashford University
Instructor Arthur Baldonado
Monday October 7, 2014

WEEK TWO ASSIGNMENT

Methods of measuring the quality of care in hospitals is a relatively new science. These
methods require large amounts of capital and other resources to develop and collect information.
Only the most common conditions or processes of quality care are available for reporting. But, in
recent years there has been an increased interest in the methods for measuring quality, which
may have a positive effect on the development of more in depth quality measurement methods
and the reporting of them over time. Private and public organizations have joined in the cause of
working for the improvement and expansion of quality measures in health care. Memorial
Hospital is one of these health organizations that has always concentrated on offering high
quality health care to its patients by giving them close personal attention. Memorials
administrator, Janice Fry has concerns on how to go about maintaining high levels of quality care
in the future. This report will discuss a few methods that are used by hospitals to measure
quality, and which of these could be applied by Memorial Hospital. Also, a discussion of the
potential costs associated with quality will be held. This report will conclude by suggesting ideas
and techniques from TQM that can be used by Mrs. Fry to help Memorial Hospital focus on
providing quality health care.

There are many scientific methods that can be used to measure health care quality. Health
care professionals use measures to review and improve the quality of care that they provide to
their patients. Examples of sound quality measures are information retrieved from the records of
patients, or operational procedures and processes that are converted into rates ,percentages, or
times that show how well providers are taking care of their patients(Prabhakar Kalepu, 2014).
Many hospitals , like Northwestern Memorial Hospital in Augusta , GA, use choose treatment
and procedure measures that are valid, reliable, and that can be compared with data from
government and other national organizations(). Some hospitals use the data from independent

WEEK TWO ASSIGNMENT

national measurement agencies that have developed statistical methods to adjust for severity of
patient illness when predicting outcomes. The Center for Medicaid and Medicare Services
(CMS) has a program where they will make value-based incentive payments to acute care
hospitals, based either on how well the hospitals perform on certain quality measures or how
much the hospitals performance improves in regards to quality.

There are a few potential costs and failures of quality that Memorial Hospital may be
presented with and must be addressed and measured. The first two are what the text call
appraisal and prevention cost. Appraisal costs are the costs incurred to measure quality, assess
customer satisfaction, and inspect and test products. Prevention costs result from activities
designed to prevent defects from occurring and include activities such as employee training,
quality control procedures, special efforts when designing products, or administrative systems to
prevent defects (Vonderembse & White, 2013). Since there is a need for quality measurements in
Memorial Hospital, the cost associated with such measures will be fall under appraisal costs.
There will also be cost associated with the advertisement and marketing on Memorials claim of
superior patient service. Memorial would also incur prevention cost by finding errors in
procedures and processes associated with quality measurements. Examples of this could be
errors in data, patients records and other administrative processes.

Total quality management (TQM) is a management system based on customer

satisfaction and is used by customer focused organizations, and involves all employees for
continued improvement. It uses strategy, data, and effective communications to integrate the
quality discipline into the culture and activities of the organization (Green, 2012). There are three
concepts of the TQM that relate to the health care setting, and they include: continuous

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improvement and learning, a focus on customers, participation and teamwork by all employees.
In order to obtain excellence in quality and service, hospitals must work to stay mistake free.
This requires continuous efforts to improve the quality of the service delivery system. Situations
such as long wait times for service, low quality treatment which leads to repeated surgery
procedures, and extra cost to patients can be avoided by improving the total service quality.

WEEK TWO ASSIGNMENT

References

Green, T. J. (2012). TQM and organizational culture: How do they link? Total Quality
Management & Business Excellence, 23(2), 141-157.
doi:10.1080/14783363.2012.647847

Prabhakar Kalepu, R. (2014). Service Quality in Healthcare Sector: An Exploratory Study on

Hospitals. IUP Journal of Marketing Management, 13(1), 7-28.

Vonderembse, M. & White, G. (2013). Operations management. San Diego, CA: Bridgepoint
Education, Inc