Legal Aspects of U.S. Health Care System Administration
Justifying Position as a Top Administrator
As a top administrator in Well Care Hospital in Happy Town, I am held responsible for the administration of the daily running of the organization. As such professionalism, which serves as the basis of health care service contract, should be maintained (Kongstvedt, 2012). It is my legal obligation to adhere to the set state and federal standards which are overseeing the administration of health care to the patients. Being a top administrator, I should uphold good standards that should be emulated by other employees in the organization. By creating an atmosphere that ensures following of not only the state and federal statutes but also my already set standards, the employees will be in a position to makes succinct decisions, which adhere to these standards (Cherry & Jacob, 2016). Negligence and ethical dilemmas will be avoided hence better health care services will be likely provided.
Ramifications of Professional Staff Compromise the Boundaries of ethics and medical conduct
Professionals in any organization are expected to be clients’ oriented by placing the interests of the clients before theirs (Kongstvedt, 2012). (Mulheron (2016) states that boundaries within professionalism dictate that health care service providers should maintain protection and remain dedicated to safeguarding the interests of the patients. Crossing of these boundaries in health care organizations will result in cases of negligence. Moreover, legal actions, such as facing lawsuits and criminal proceedings, can result from breaching these boundaries. Some of the possible boundaries to be crossed within health care organizations include breaching of confidentiality and unauthorized access of patients’ data (Doukas, McCullough & Wear, 2012).
Elements Required of a Plaintiff to Prove Medical Negligence.
Mason, Leavitt, and Chaffee (2013) define negligence in health care organizations as the failure of a worker to give the expected service to a person under normal circumstance. Negligence occurs when a person fails to give services that a normal person would give under the same circumstances. Negligence can be classified into three forms, which include nonfeasance, malfeasance, and misfeasance (Mason et al., 2013). In this case, the four elements needed for a plaintiff to prove negligence while disseminating health care services include causation, breach of duty, injury and duty to care.
Breach of duty which is one element that addresses the reasoning behind negligence entails failing to act rationally while giving services to another person. Kongstvedt (2012) opines that standard care is necessary to be maintained and be well defined for all the workers to understand a reasonable way that they should act towards giving care to clients. Based on standard care defined, the expert witness can testify on behalf of a plaintiff. In cases within a health care set up where a surgeon conducts surgery in the wrong area, the breach is evident hence legal action can be taken (Oyebode, 2013). As such, the surgeon can be judged and legal action taken against them.
The duty of care is defined as the legal obligation of maintaining good care performance and maintain standards to safeguard the welfare of other people (Mason et al., 2013). This is considered as the first step when establishing negligence. Maintaining duty of care reciprocates with avoidance of negligence. For the duty of care to be maintained, a relationship must exist between the patient and healthcare service providers. Oyebode (2013) argues that doctors and nurses should be accountable for their actions. In case a relationship does not exist, duty of care cannot be maintained. The patient should see a doctor as a professional within the health care organization environment and as a nonprofessional outside the health care organization environs (Doukas et al., 2012). An instance of duty of care is where customers expect good food to be cooked by a chef in a hotel. In this instance, the chef is held responsible for food cooked to these customers at that time.
Causation is another element that involves proving that there is a reasonable relationship between the damages suffered by plaintiff and relationship between defendant’s negligence. For an injury to occur, the negligence of the defendant is one of the causal factor (Mulheron, 2016). The last element is injury caused by breach of set standards (Mulheron, 2016). Injury can be caused by either an organization or a person. In a case of injury in an automotive accident, the cause of injury is the driver who fails to stop to avoid the accident or who over speeds hence endangering the lives of passengers. In case of lack of injuries, no monetary damages are recorded due to the accident.
Overarching Duties of the Health Care Governing Board in Mitigating the Effects of Medical Non-compliance
As a top administrator, I am expected to control, coordinate, organize and direct health care services based on the enacted policies by the board of trustees (Cherry & Jacob, 2016). I am also expected to come up with budget plans and establish rates for offering health services. In addition to these, I am expected to play a role in maintaining quality assurance and maintain public outreach. Maintaining patients’ safety is my overall priority and that of the management board in Well Care Hospital. Based on our mission in this hospital, it is our priority to ensure that patients are treated with utmost dignity and that they are involved in any decision making process (Doukas, McCullough & Wear, 2012). The set standards in Well Care Hospital ensure that all health care service providers follow the right steps in administering good care to the patients. To oversee this, I am expected to frequently assess the operations within the hospital and compile a report to be evaluated by the board (Cherry & Jacob, 2016). Based on the report, areas that do not maintain the set standards of the hospital can be rectified.
References
Cherry, B., & Jacob, S. R. (2016). Contemporary nursing: Issues, trends, & management. Amsterdam: Elsevier Health Sciences.
Doukas, D. J., McCullough, L. B., & Wear, S. (2012). Perspective: Medical education in medical ethics and humanities as the foundation for developing medical professionalism. Academic Medicine, 87(3), 334-341.
Kongstvedt, P. R. (2012). Essentials of managed health care. Massachusetts: Jones & Bartlett Publishers.
Mason, D. J., Leavitt, J. K., & Chaffee, M. W. (2013). Policy and Politics in Nursing and Healthcare-Revised Reprint. Amsterdam: Elsevier Health Sciences.
Mulheron, R. (2016). Medical negligence: non-patient and third party claims. New York: Routledge.
Oyebode, F. (2013). Clinical errors and medical negligence. Medical Principles and Practice, 22(4), 323-333.
