American Health Quality Foundation

By Donald Bryant

Are you tracking the costs of the processes at your site? Do you know how much your quality programs are costing you? They should be saving more than you spend. Unfortunately, few healthcare organizations or even manufacturers have their accounting set up to track costs for the many processes at their sites. Standard accounting procedures are good at tracking such things as expenses for supplies, for payroll and for accounts receivable. Unfortunately, accountants are not taught to track costs of processes such as delivering an annual physical exam by a primary care physician or the expense of getting a room at a hospital ready for the next patient. Accounting software such as Quickbooks has no provision for tracking such expenses.

Why am I asking if you track the costs of your processes, anyway? There are several reasons. First, even if you are a nonprofit, you cannot afford to provide quality healthcare at a loss indefinitely. I know that it seems the Federal government expects just that in Medicaid programs and seems to be heading in that direction with Medicare. Keeping track of your process costs will help you provide effective care at an overall profit if you use techniques such as value stream mapping.

Secondly, tracking costs with return on investments is the language of upper management. Management is more likely to continue support for a program or process if they can see a positive return on investment (ROI). If you can demonstrate a positive ROI through process accounting you will gain the confidence of management in your healthcare programs.

Further, by controlling costs or even by reducing costs, you can pass on some savings to your patients and clients. This makes you more competitive and creates client loyalty. I believe that the delivery of medical care will only become more competitive in the United States. Recently, President Bush signed an executive order that the Medicare system should make available cost and quality data of healthcare providers that provide Medicare services. Locally, our hospitals are advertising in order to compete in providing ER services. You have to be competitive; tracking quality and process costs will help a great deal. Continue Reading

By Will Speer

How often do you suffer from headaches, chesty coughs and dizziness? How many times have you been to see a doctor but your health does not improve? One of the causes overlooked is the growth of mould especially on the walls of your bedroom. It is unnoticeable at the first glance but, upon closer inspection, you will see a fine blackish thing growing on the wall usually beginning as a small black dot. It emits spores into the air and we end up breathing them into our lungs. It then grows in our lungs and cause health problems.

You can either hire a professional painter to scrape, clean and paint the wall or you can do it yourself. If you are doing it yourself, you will need to purchase home health quality improvement tools such as;

* a sponge and a strong detergent
* paint scraper, paint roller, paint tray, interior water based paint, thinner, sandpaper

All we need to purchase are the above tools. The most expensive item will be the water based paint. Apart from these it will be helpful to have in hand old towels, old newspapers or old plastic sheets and a ladder or high stool. Below are the steps suggested: Continue Reading

By Michael Hume

Protect Your Vitality By Refreshing Your Health Habits

What role should the government be playing in health care?

The answer depends upon your ideological view toward the government in general… what role should the government be playing in ANY aspect of our day-to-day lives?

On the Left, the general belief is that government should play a heavy role in health care. All members of society, they argue, should have access to exactly the same level of medical care, regardless of achievement or station. To assure this outcome, the government must control health care. This philosophy gave rise to such nationalized medical programs as collectivist health care in the old Soviet Union and communist China, the National Institute of Health in the United Kingdom, and “Obamacare” in the United States. The Left points to abuses by private insurers and doctors as support for their basic preference for heavy state control of health care. Continue Reading