Assignment Task: Read the article to prepare for this assignment.
Article: Advancing health equity through organizational change: Perspectives from health care leaders By Julia A. Doherty, Margaret Johnson, and Heather McPheron
Selected Healthcare Services Organization (HSO):
For the duration of this course, I will focus on community hospitals, specifically those operating in rural and underserved areas. These hospitals provide essential healthcare services such as emergency care, primary care, and outpatient services. To provide a more structured and comprehensive analysis, I will use AdventHealth Hendersonville-a rural community hospital within the broader AdventHealth system-as a representative HSO for my study. This organization has implemented telemedicine services and shares many characteristics with smaller community hospitals facing similar operational and technological challenges. Need Assignment Help?
Plan for Gathering Information on the Selected HSO:
To gather the necessary information about AdventHealth Hendersonville, I will use multiple strategies that include public document review, administrative interviews, and data from healthcare databases. This blended approach will allow for a complete understanding of the organization's structure, challenges, and strategic direction.
First, I will review the AdventHealth website and its Hendersonville subsite. These will provide direct access to the organization's mission, vision, and values, details about the services offered, and insight into its organizational structure. These platforms often publish annual community benefit reports or newsletters that include information on strategic initiatives and market positioning. I will also consult public databases such as those maintained by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) and the American Hospital Association (AHA). These databases contain objective performance metrics, hospital quality ratings, and financial risk indicators. In addition, nonprofit data repositories such as GuideStar and ProPublica can provide access to IRS Form 990 filings, which offer a snapshot of the hospital's financial standing, including revenue, expenses, and risk factors. To gather deeper insights, I will request interviews with hospital administrators, including key personnel such as the Chief Medical Information Officer (CMIO), the Director of Telehealth or Telemedicine Services, a Human Resources manager, and an IT or Compliance officer. These interviews will focus on understanding operational challenges related to telemedicine, internal training practices, issues of data security and regulatory compliance, and strategic planning processes.
If possible, I will also gather internal documents or staff insights by collaborating with someone employed at the hospital. These may include internal strategy documents, employee satisfaction surveys, training materials for telemedicine platforms, or communication memos regarding organizational culture. This will be especially helpful for analyzing the cultural climate of the organization and understanding how staff perceive the integration of telemedicine into clinical practice. To explore external factors affecting the organization, such as rural broadband limitations, regulatory pressures, and workforce shortages, I will review relevant state health department policies, as well as research from the American Telemedicine Association and recent healthcare legislation updates. By combining website reviews, regulatory data, interviews, and academic research, I intend to collect comprehensive data across all the required domains: mission, vision, values, organizational chart, services, market positioning, financial status, internal and external influences, potential strategic actions, and cultural climate. For any information that is not publicly accessible, I will rely on direct communication with hospital leadership and designated staff members to fill those gaps.
This strategic and multifaceted information-gathering plan is designed to support a robust analysis of AdventHealth Hendersonville's telemedicine initiatives and overall operational framework. By focusing on this rural community hospital, I aim to understand how information management can be optimized to improve telemedicine services, particularly in underserved areas. If any essential information proves unattainable, I am prepared to pivot to a comparable HSO that offers sufficient transparency and accessibility to support the study.
References:
- AdventHealth. (n.d.). About us.
- Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services. (n.d.). Hospital Compare.
- Hadian, M., et al. (2023). Challenges of Implementing Telemedicine Technology. International Journal of Preventive Medicine, 15(8).
- Anawade, P. A., Sharma, D., &Gahane, S. (2024). Exploring the Impact of Telemedicine on Healthcare Accessibility. Cureus, 16(3):e55996.
- Benjamin, I., et al. (2024). The Role of Telemedicine in Rural America. International Journal of Science and Research Archive, 12(2), 188-205.
The Assignment:
Conduct a comparison of your own HSO to at least two market competitors. In your comparison include:
- Mission, vision, and values statements
- Organizational size and structure chart
- Services offered
- Relative position in the market
- Organizational efforts to promote diversity, equity, and inclusion.