Q&A: Following the Quadruple Aim to improve clinical experience
Q: The Quadruple Aim includes the goal of improving the work life of healthcare providers, like clinicians and staff. Do you have any advice for how to improve the clinical experience?
A: Effective hospital outcomes rely on the healthcare team’s commitment, dedication, and skills. A case management and social work team is uniquely positioned to pull together the elements of care and to align initiatives and patient outcomes.
Although there is much good work on standardizing outcomes through evidence-based care, case management helps maintain the team’s patient centeredness by ensuring that the plan is realistic give the patient’s unique needs. Even though disease management processes have a predictable trajectory, each patient brings his or her own story, strengths, and capacity to the healthcare journey. Case managers must recognize these traits and develop an evidence-based plan that is customized for the individual patient’s success.
Employee engagement, as discussed in the Quadruple Aim, is important to a successful workforce. When you ask whether someone has a job or a career, those who answer that they have a career indicate that they are engaged and that they embrace their clinical skills to get the job done.
The Harvard Business Review offers insights into the drivers of employee engagement. See below:
Leadership
- Clearly demonstrates loyalty to the organization
- Is trustworthy
- Is effective in building the business
Clarity of the organization’s goals and mission
- Employees are clear about the hospital goals
- Employees are clear how their job connects to the organization’s mission
Supervision of work
- Staff are treated with respect
- New ideas are encouraged and embraced
Work and life balance
- Opportunities are provided to manage stress levels
- Work arrangements are flexible
- Teams are right-sized
Career development
- Opportunities for personal and professional growth are offered
For more information, see Care Transitions in Case Management.