Quality and Safety in Healthcare

This report addresses the need for quality and safety improvement in the healthcare sector in Australia. It discusses the Australian health system, standards, and assessment. It also analyzes the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats in the sector.

Running head: QUALITY AND SAFETY IN HEALTHCARE
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Quality and Safety in Healthcare
Student’s Name
Intuitional Affiliation

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Introduction
Many firms and sectors in the world are striving to meet the need of their
customers. A firm that is offering quality good and services to its customer is likely to
perform better compared to those who don’t offer quality and safe services and goods.
The quality of a commodity is the degree to which a good or a service meets the needs of
a customer. Safety is the assurance of no risk when using a particular commodity. In
healthcare, quality means the acting of delivering the best possible services to the patients
using the appropriate resources and knowledge while safety is the act of reducing risk due
to medical error or medical to a minimum acceptable level.
The objective of this report is to address the need for quality and safety
improvement in the healthcare sector in Australia using theoretical concepts of quality
and safety to a health setting. I will also include strengths, weaknesses and challenging
issues in the Australian healthcare sector and recommend a new course of action.

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Australian Health System.
In Australia, healthcare is provided by universal health care and private providers.
The main health care services are offered publicly in the primary health care and public
hospitals while the private sector provides the remaining services such as dental and
physiotherapy and private hospitals. Medicare Australia is in control of administering
health care. Medicare its mainly concerned with payment of nursing staff and doctor and
the funding of state-run clinics and hospitals. In the year 2005/2006, Australian statistic
data on health sector showed that the country had one doctor per 322 people and one
clinic bed per 244 patients (Cormie et al.,2015). The statistics also show that the country
currently has 70,200 medical specialist that includes the doctors and other specialist and
257,200 registered nurses. Despite growth in the workforce in the healthcare sector in the
country, there is still a deficiency of health professionals.
Standards in the Australian health system
Australian commission of safety and quality sets the rules that control and guide
the scope of practice in the healthcare sector. In every three years, the commission
accredits health care services in the country against National Quality Health services
(NSQHS) standards. The process of accreditation involves quality assurance methods and
checking whether the systems are working effectively to offer the expected standards of
quality and safety.
The commission provides accrediting resources to aid staff who are ready and
preparing for the assessment on its standards. These resources provide the necessary
health policies and supporting procedures that are used by staff or students to meet the

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principles within the commission’s rules. I have covered two standards in this essay, the
“Clinical Governance and partnering” and “Partnering with consumers.” The Clinical
Governance and partnering standard state the heads of health services firms are
accountable and responsible to their customers by improving the quality and safety of
their services by making sure they are safe, effective and patient-centered. The partnering
with consumer standard states that the heads of the health services firms should design,
implement and uphold systems to work with consumers needs and expectation (O’Brien
et al.,2015). These partnerships are a concern with the planning, developing, delivery,
measurement and assessment of services offered by healthcare firms.
Assessment of the Australian Health System
The primary objective of the Australian healthcare system is to meet and address
the need for quality and safety demands of its stakeholders. I used the SWOT analysis to
help in assessing the health care system in the country and address the need for quality
and safety improvements in the sector of health care (Laver et al.,2016). The SWOT
analysis will aid in identifying the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threat in the
sector. The following are the results of the SWOT analysis of the Australian Health
System that includes its strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats.

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Strengths
Medicare
Medicare is a world-class system in the healthcare sector in Australia that oversees the
operations of the public hospitals in the country. The system has enabled public patients to
receive free treatment from the public hospital. They receiving free treatment from the public
hospitals has enabled all citizens in the country the chance and right to receive medical services.
The Medicare also covers 85% pay fee when a patient from a public hospital is scheduled to visit
a doctor outside the public hospitals (Carney,2015). Medicare through the Australian
commission of safety and quality sets the standards that control and guide the scope of practice
in the healthcare sector. For example, ‘Clinical Governance and partnering standard’ ensures that
the leaders in health care sectors ensure that their firms meet the necessary standards by having
the qualified employees and equipment while the ‘partnering with consumer standard’ ensures
that there is a good relationship between the health care firms and their consumers.
Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme
The pharmaceutical scheme in the country aids in assessing medicines in the country to
ensure they meet the necessary standards (Quatela et al.,2017). The scheme also ensures that all
Australian resident has access to the appropriate and lifesaving medicines at the right time with a
favourable price. The scheme enabled the citizens in the country to have the right medicine
which is lifesaving which makes the citizens satisfied with the health sector in the country.

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Private Health sector
A more significant percentage of the Australian are members of private insurance fund on
health. The private system complements the public sector and gives its customers a variety of
choice in health care services such as choice of specialist (Koch, & Jones, 2018). Private sector
insurance also provides services that are not covered by Medicare such as dental and podiatry
services.
Weaknesses
Although the health sector in the country is well controlled and governed, it has some
weaknesses such a having a complicated structure. For example, the funding of public hospital is
shared among the territory, federal and state government (Bar-Zeev et al.,2017). The following
are challenges facing the health sector in the country.
Equity issues
The health outcomes in Australia have a bigger improvement in the past decade which
has resulted in lowering death rate, improved life expectancy and better ailment control.
However, these outcomes are not enjoyed equally to all groups in the country. There is a huge
gap within the health care treatment where rich people receive better services compared to the
less affluent (Healy, & Walton, 2016) These equity issues also are available in other sectors
while the rich always have the best in the market as they can pay the specialist in any given
sector. The government should improve its services in the public hospitals to ensure the less
affluent have better access to better services.

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Technology costs
Technology has improved the lives of its stakeholders in the health sector by helping in
diagnostics and control of deadly ailments. The technology has also enabled the patients and
doctors to communicate while the patients are still at home. However, the technological
inventions have some disadvantages as the hospitals will have to use the modern equipment and
tools as a result of the introduction of new machines in the hospitals (Mahuteau, Mavromaras,
Richardson & Zhu, 2017). The hospitals will also have to dissolve some of the old equipment as
they cannot operate with the new technology. Buying new tools and training of staff to know
about using the latest equipment costs the government a lot of money (Delany et al.,2015). The
technology cost has forced the public hospital to continue using the old equipment while the
private hospitals are using modern equipment and technology.
Opportunities.
The new opportunities in the sector of health care can be used to aid in determining a new
course of action to solve weaknesses and threats in the industry. The improved technology is an
opportunity that a healthcare sector can use to improve service delivery and customer satisfaction
(Degeling et al., 2017). The Australian government should equip the public hospital with the
modern equipment to enable the less affluent in society to enjoy better services that the affluent
citizens receive from the private hospitals. The health care sector is expecting thousands of
graduates from the university per year. By the next five years, the industry will have professional
enough both in private and public hospitals.

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Weaknesses and Threats
The health sector in Australia is experiencing a shortage of specialist and staff such as
nurses. The shortage limits the hospitals to the extent they can deliver services to patients. The
hospitals are also experiencing a shortage of modern equipment mostly in the public hospital.
Lack of modern equipment is limiting the hospitals to embrace the new technology (Baum et
al.,2016).
Conclusion
The Australian government has invest heavily in the the sector of health care to ensure
that its citizen are receiving quality and safe health services (Willis, Reynolds,& Keleher,2016).
Through Medicare, the citizens can access free treatment in a public hospital. The Australian
should check on the opportunities available in the healthcare sector and work on the weakness to
maximize better services delivery. The Australian government should equip the public hospital
with modern equipment to ensure that the citizen can receive all services for free from the public
hospital and also to meet the need for quality and safety improvement in healthcare in Australia.

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