Economic principles in Decision Making
Economic principles in Decision Making
Unit outcomes addressed in this Assignment: •Utilize economic principles in decision making. •Use planning and prioritization to achieve organizational goals. Course outcomes addressed in this Assignment: • Apply economic principles to health care decision making. • Achieve goals through planning and prioritization. Instructions: In this scenario you have been hired by the World Health Organization. As a leader in the organization you have been assigned to assess a small developing nation and determine the most cost effective public health solutions to improve overall health in the country. You need to select public health options that will allow you to help the most people. You have a budget of $700 million, you cannot divide services in half as a means of cutting cost and you cannot go over budget. Review an overview of the country as well as the available public health services using this document: •Economic Health Decision Making Data Requirements: •Use the Unit 5 Assignment Submission Template to indicate your selections and write your narrative. •A 500-800 word narrative explaining how you used planning and prioritization to make your decisions and reach your goal as well as which of the Unit 4 trainings you found most prepared you for this Assignment and why.
SAMPLE ANSWER
| Service | Cost | Reason for Selection: |
| Basic health education and empowerment | $120 million | Focusing on interactive group education on health factors such as nutrition and family planning, is critical in promoting health, especially in a developing nation. |
| vaccination | $50 million | Administering vaccines will mostly focus on children and pregnant women. This is necessary for the prevention infectious diseases. |
| basic sanitation and supply of clean water | $130 million | In such a developing nation, poor hygiene and inadequacy of clean water has a significant impact on the general health of the people, hence the need for supply of clean, purified water. |
| Access to antibiotics | $50 million | As a developing nation, the need for antibiotics is high and with this amount, it would be possible to provide adequate antibiotics to treat infections. |
| Disease detection | $75 million | Health promotion will be more natural if the country develops the necessary measures to monitor the outbreak and spread of infections. |
| Maternal and childcare | $50 million | As mothers and children are most affected in this country, setting aside such an amount is essential to provide necessary care to reduce morbidity and mortality rates |
| Control of communicable diseases | $50 million | This service will be beneficial in preventing the spread of infectious diseases such as measles and hepatitis, considering that such diseases significantly contribute to increased death rates. |
| Vector control | $25 million | Vector control will assist in the elimination of diseases causing insects. |
| Properly equipping the health centers | $ 100 million | Community health centers will be equipped with necessary tools and adequately staffed to provide quality care and improve general wellbeing of the citizens. |
| Training programs | $50 million | Training programs should be developed to efficiently train future health providers and equip them with necessary skills to provide quality care. |
| Service | Cost | Reason Not Selected: |
| Developing more health center | $350 million | As the country is still developing, there is still a need for advanced health facilities. However, this would be challenging to implement due to the costs involved. |
| Screening services | $300 million | For diseases that require advanced screening and tests, it might be challenging to achieve this due to the funds required as well as the equipment. |
| Development of infrastructure | $100 million | Timely access to health facilities is significantly affected by poorly developed roads. However, to develop better transport systems, the organization might be forced to work with the authorities. Road building is expensive and is not under the control of health sector policymakers. |
Narrative
Planning and priority setting in healthcare are necessary since resources will always be limited, hence the need for prioritization. In the given case, a budget of $700million was provided to improve health provision in a small developing nation and the choices to invest in a particular service reflects the society’s values and visions for the health systems. Considering the setting of a developing nation, the principle decisions to focus on areas such as health education and maternal health care over other services were made after a situational analysis.
Economic principles in Decision Making
By incorporating planning and prioritization in the decision-making process, the aim was to select and address the most critical health issues among different options. However, essential issues of health in this case may not be viewed with the same weight as those of people in developed countries. In such countries health targets are achieved by emphasizing on healthy lifestyles and disease minimization through supportive environment. In this case, though, factors such as water purification and sanitation were prioritized as well as individual involvement in health provision. Further, other areas of focus like nutritional education and vaccination are prioritized over other health issues like cancer screening. Planning and priority-setting was used based on the most affected population and the most common health issues affecting the population in question. However, this was not just focused on prioritizing the health problems, but also the possible intervention
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Among the different options available for health investment, the priorities selected were influenced by various factors besides the limited financial resources. Such choices were influenced by the general distribution of resources as a response to population needs and demands. For instance, in such developing country, health promotion must begin from the basics of general health education such as hygiene, before implementing more advanced care. As such, while other areas of health providers such as setting up of new health facilities might be regarded important, effectiveness can only be attained if the citizens are also trained on personal health. This would assist in preventing overcrowding in those health centers and unnecessary hospital visits. The priorities were also influenced by the need to reduce the high mortality rates that were attributed to lack of vaccination, antibiotics, and antenatal care. Further, the priority setting in selecting health interventions was based on the options that would achieve high health standards and maximization as required by WHO, reduce health inequalities, as well as financial protection.
In the previous unit, financial management was identified as a critical factor when it comes to health provision and proper budgeting. In this case, health provision must take into consideration all-round factors ranging from development of health facilities, provision of cost-effective medication, and holistic care. As cost is an essential factor of health provision, focusing on health improvement in such developing nation would require effective planning and prioritizing essential services to the most affected groups. As such, issues such as immunization and vaccination to prevent communicable diseases as well as provision of health education to the general public must be addressed first.
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