Safety and Quality in Health Care Essay Sample

• Subject Name : Healthcare

National Safety & Quality Health Service (NSQHS) Standards

Table of Contents

Introduction

Body

Conclusion

References

Introduction to National Safety and Quality Health Service (NSQHS)

The National Safety and Quality Health Service (NSQHS) was formulated by the Australian Commission on Quality and safety in fraternizing with Australian national and local government, the medical practitioners, and nurses. The main objective of NSQHS is to protect the community from distress, pain and to provide quality health service to ensure assured medical examination and it's standards. Like the NHS, American health services, and European health service providers, Australia has also privatized its medical system through NSQHS, which provides all the subjects conjugated with medical services. NSQHS is revised yearly and it's 8 standards are as follows as per the (“Australian Commission on Safety and Quality in Health Care”, 2012):

• Standard of Clinical governance
• Standard of Partnering with consumers
• Standard of Preventing and controlling healthcare-associated infection
• Standard of Medication safety
• Standard of Comprehensive care
• Standard of Communicating for safety
• Standard ofBlood management
• Standard of Recognizing and responding to acute deterioration .

The standards act as pivotal for any medical practitioner and patient.

Body

We will be discussing only 3 NSQHS standards that provide provision for nurses and stewards which are quintessential for their work regulation and safety gear. The standards are as follows:

Standard 3 - the standard of Preventing and controlling healthcare-associated infection

Figure-heads of health organizations have developed strategies to deal with ever-changing antimicrobial resistance issues, drug resistance, infectious disease problems to achieve good health consequences for patients through the development of antimicrobial stewardship, and nursing facilities.

Criteria:

Infection prevention and control systems as in the guidelines of prevention and infection of Australia ensures the standard and transmission-based safety, hand hygiene, techniques which are aseptic in it's mechanisms, use of invasive medical devices, clean environment, and immunization of workforce for the nurse. It is very ardent for all the clinicians and nurses to know the safety penalties.

Antimicrobial stewardship discusses all the policies and contracts related to transmission guidelines that are mentioned here. The nurses and medical staffs need to be a part of this stewardship as they are dealing with the patients of the high potential of infection in the first line mechanisms of medical care.

Redefining of medical devices to make it reusable. The nurses have to be aware of the reprocessing regulation, as the standards have to meet the national and international conjunction guidelines set by Australian government.

Integrating clinician governance the nurses are part of the medical health system of a country, they should know about the clinical governance principles as it concerns safety issues of management and policies related to it.

The nurses and clinicians are part of the organizational process of the health care association of Australia so they have to collaborate with the government, the hospital, the patient parties to implement strategies, processing of reports and medication, monitoring the outcomes, health-associated infections and implementing the knowledge of stewardship. This sets their goal of 'do's and don’ts". They become knowledgeable about the safety they will be receiving as they face the risk of being infected from a patient as they are at the first line of duty. By assuring the governance, the Australian government is the guardian of its health service providers. The committee and legislation are at mercy to protect its providers. The complexities of clinical management are well marked with national and international l standards so that the medical staff does not have any problem associated with infection, transmission, and safety rules. The legislation is the care provider so the nurses become privileged to the entitlement of lawsuit, medical safety guidelines association. As their priority is health individual protection and avoidance of transmission as they may be vectors of disease or any health-related problem. Their safety and security are at risk so every nurse is to abide by the action and criterion of standard 3 NSQHS authorization Hamilton, 2016).

Standard 4 - Medical safety standard

Aim of the standard is to implement association to monitor and mitigate the medication incidence, improve the issues related to intake of medication with its quality improvement. It also authorizes the medication usage and documents the results.

Criteria

The improvement of Clinical governance implements the improvement of measures to help and support the management of medication- the nurses must be acquainted with the medication delivery model,it's dosage, and utilization as demonstrated by the clinician. It includes all the policies and documentation related to medication safety and medical safety.

Patient information documentation- the nurses who are directly responding to the patients need to regularly note down the medication, prescription, admission, and discharge report summary of the patients which are to be given to the patient party duly as per the period of testing and supervision.

Prevalence of medication management- the continuity of medication and it's dosage will go on so it's important to keep the comprehension and awareness ongoing of treatments, clinical trials, and dosage application. The database stores the information in the form of a catalog and publishes periodically so that the nurses and medical practitioners are aware of it and use it in the future, as it becomes guidelines for the future medical treatment (Gilbert et al., 2017).

Process of medication management- provides information and decision support tools for medicines and it also provides a way to safely secure the medication for storage and distribution. It also includes the list of medical apparatus and highly critical medicines.

Now the question arises why do the nurses need to know about standard 4?

Who is taking care of the patients and regularly monitoring them, so the framework is issued for them to understand the medicines and if they alter with medication there will be side-effects or do in an emergency if the doctor is not around and the patient is unstable? What medication can be given to subside the reaction? So it plays a role as manual for the nurses to know medicines and it's side effects and immediately handling capacity specialization. This manual engages the nurse to be known to the basics and not to mishandle any medicine. The risk of keeping the patients safe is in the hands of people who are in the first line of duty. There is medicine associated with trauma patients (2-3%) who are admitted to the hospital (2020).

So guidelines and manuals become important for the nurses to go through and keep detailed knowledge about it.

Standard 5- Comprehensive Care Standard

Aim of this standard is to provide overall and continued care for patients keeping in mind their mental, economic, lifestyle-based needs along with physical and mental ones. The main purpose of this standard is to assess individualized patient needs and predict and prevent the patient from any future harm. This is done as part of the continuum of care for an improved lifestyle and higher health standard. In-hospital care is customized according to the specialized need of the patient. Such needs are assessed under a recommended methodology which then further improves and enhances the patient’s medical care (National Safety and Quality Health Service Standards |Ausmed, 2020).

Clinical governance and quality improvement to support comprehensive care

• Partnership with consumers to ensure a customized plan for individualistic needs
• Support systems along with clinical governance and supervision are needed for the quality improvement and ensuring of the deliverance of comprehensive care with the following methods:
• Application quality enhancement methods like clinical supervision and independent third party regulation for unbiased deliverance of care
• Integration of clinical governance in developing a comprehensive care plan for medical feasibility and sustainability
• Deliverance of such comprehensive care plan with specifically designed systems made of patients, health workers, family, and other professionals
• Collaborative teamwork of all the members of such system

Developing a comprehensive care plan

• Developing a comprehensive care plan by maintaining optimum levels of qualitative analysis (Ritchie et al., 2020)
• The plan has to be developed by assessing the patient’s overall condition through the following methods.
• Clinical assessment of the patient’s medical condition
• Screening of risk factors that may provide a hindrance to the quality of future lifestyle
• Planning for comprehensive care according to the physical, mental, economic, social and medical needs of the patient

Delivering comprehensive care

• The deliverance of such care becomes more sensitive and essential for terminally ill patients, where utmost caution is required.
• Comprehensive care at the end of life has to more about the individualistic need for improving the patient’s life’s quality (The NSQHS Standards | Australian Commission on Safety and Quality in Health Care, 2020).
• Using the comprehensive care plan considering the terminal condition of the patient

Prevention and prediction of harm

Minimizing the risks that may endanger the patient’s life’s quality and result in further exacerbation is to be included in the comprehensive care plan through the following:

• Prediction, prevention, and management of self-harming and suicidal tendencies of a patient that is under psychological stress due to their medical condition
• Prevention of delirium and management of cognitive impairment that may arise due to the patient’s health conditions
• Prediction, prevention, and management of any aggressive and violent behavior that may be triggered by the in-hospital conditions.
• Prevention and management of pressure injuries like bed sores which are caused due to sedentary lifestyle and restricted movements, Preventing falls and harm from falls
• Minimization of restrictive practices like seclusion that may result in worsening the mental condition of the patient by providing a safe and inviting environment for the patient to remain calm and composed in
• Providing proper nutrition and hydration to ensure healthy body development
• Minimization of restrictive practices by early prediction of such factors and tailored approach towards eradication them to avoid mental stress associated with restrictive practices

Conclusion on National Safety and Quality Service 

The standards declared by the National Safety and Quality Health Service (NSQHS) have been developed and enhanced over time, where each standard has a specific reason and purpose supported by past experience. These standards not only help the clinicians in prolonging a patient’s life but they also help the patients receive the best care following their requirements. Through this not only the survival of a patient is ensured, but also a better quality of life is given which the patient shall be enthusiastic to lead.

References for Safety and Quality in Health Care Essay 

(2020). Retrieved 4 May 2020, from https://www.safetyandquality.gov.au/stan

Ausmed.com.au. 2020. National Safety And Quality Health Service Standards |Ausmed. [online] Available at: <https://www.ausmed.com.au/cpd/articles/national-safety-and-quality-health-service-standards> [Accessed 4 May 2020].

Australian Commission on Safety and Quality in Health Care, 2012. National safety and quality health service standards. Australian Commission on Safety and Quality in Health Care.

Gilbert, A.V., Patel, B.K., Roberts, M.S., Williams, D.B., Crofton, J.H., Morris, N.M., Wallace, J. and Gilbert, A.L., 2017. An audit of medicines information quality in electronically generated discharge summaries–evidence to meet the Australian National Safety and Quality Health Service Standards. Journal of Pharmacy Practice and Research, 47(5), pp.355-364.

Hamilton, S., 2019. The new NSQHS standards: One day surgery unit's accreditation experience. Day Surgery Australia, 18(2), p.16.

Ritchie, A., Gilbert, C., Gaca, M., Siemensma, G. and Taylor, J., 2020. Hospital Librarians’ Contributions to Health Services’ Accreditation: An Account of the Health Libraries for the National Safety and Quality in Health Services Standards (HeLiNS) Research Project, 2016-18. Journal of the Australian Library and Information Association, pp.1-31.

Safetyandquality.gov.au. 2020. The NSQHS Standards | Australian Commission On Safety And Quality In Health Care. [online] Available at: <https://www.safetyandquality.gov.au/standards/nsqhs-standards> [Accessed 4 May 2020].

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