HCM 340 Healthcare Delivery Systems

Task:

The 2000 Institute of Medicine (IOM) report To Err is Human was a call to arms for the U.S. healthcare delivery system. It emphasized the need to explore the processes, structure, and outcomes related to the quality of care provided to individuals in our society. For your final project, you will research a gap in access to quality, equity, or efficiency of care (including existing initiatives in place to address the gap and economic and regulatory factors that are currently in place to address the gap).

Access to care includes access to health insurance coverage, access to services and providers, and timeliness of the care received. All three of these components impact quality of care. Access can also include affordability. The quality of the care people receive in the healthcare system should not vary based upon their socioeconomic status.

For your final project, you will select a healthcare delivery process gap and the population affected from the list below. Then, you will develop a healthcare delivery systems research paper.

• Option One: A gap in quality related to care coordination for individuals with chronic illnesses
• Option Two: A gap in equity related to mental health access for veterans
• Option Three: A gap in efficiency related to rising cost of pharmaceuticals for the aging population This assessment addresses the following course outcomes:
• Draw connections between current healthcare delivery systems and the context in which they were developed
• Describe the impact of economic and regulatory drivers on healthcare delivery systems
• Identify major gaps in access to healthcare for determining areas of opportunity for improved access to quality healthcare
• Explain initiatives targeted at maintaining or improving the health status of specific populations.