Design patient-centered health interventions and timelines for a selected health care problem. Address three health care issues. Design an intervention for each health issue. Identify three community resources for each health intervention.

Health Policy Implications for the Coordination and Continuum of Care

The coordination of care for stroke patients throughout the stroke continuum of care has various policy implications. The optimization of stroke care requires huge funding to coordinate all care functions efficiently. The costs of stroke care may push a number of patients and their families to opt out of care due to affordability issues, especially if the patient does not meet the eligibility for Medicaid services. This requires reforms in the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (ACA) to make special provisions for stroke patients covering the entire stroke continuum of care. It will require changing the eligibility for Medicare and Medicaid health insurance programs for stroke patients. It will also require the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act to improve its stroke provisions that cover prevention, treatment, and recovery.

Stroke care coordination also includes the use of community input. The direct involvement of the community identifies the gaps in awareness of stroke within the population. These findings will push Medicaid, Medicare, ACA policies, and CDC’s Division for Heart Disease and Stroke Prevention (DHDSP) to develop policies that optimize stroke systems and community awareness to prevent stroke and improve preparedness and response.

Establishing Care Coordination Plan Priorities

Successful care coordination requires identifying and establishing care priorities. It is important that the patient and a family member get engaged in developing the plan. Weerasekara et al. (2021) suggest first identifying what stroke survivors value the most. From a professional perspective, it is important to prioritize actions that help manage blood pressure and post-stroke fatigue and restore basic physical functions (Rudberg et al., 2020). Patient, family, and professional inputs help develop a patient-centred care plan. The stroke coordination will also need to be changed to accommodate established needs and eliminate the functions that are no longer needed as the patient recovers.

Comparison of Learning Session Content with Best Practices

Learning sessions have provided the basic knowledge required to design a care coordination plan in accordance with the best practices of care. The learning content has informed me on how to make ethical decisions when faced with ethical dilemmas with regard to patient care and the delivery of care in situations where the patient is incapacitated to make autonomous decisions. The learning sessions have also helped me understand how to identify issues or actions in the continuum of care that may be ignored but may lead to the violation of ethics of care. Conclusively, the learning sessions form the basis for understanding the best practices in health care and coordinated care.

Alignment of Teaching Sessions to the Healthy People 2030

Healthy People 2030 document establishes the national objectives for data-driven and evidence-informed health practices to improve overall well-being for the next ten years. The teaching sessions have emphasized the use of data to make evidence-based decisions for better health outcomes. It has also provided knowledge on healthcare statistics, how they are collected, the databases, how to access such statistics, and how they inform healthcare policies, decisions, and practices. Therefore, the teaching sessions are aligned with the objectives of the Healthy People 2030 document.

Conclusion

In conclusion, coordination of care harmonizes different resources from multiple providers and specialists to meet the patient’s and their family’s needs along the care continuum. Accordingly, this impacts the quality of care delivered and the costs of care. Stroke survivors require coordinated care that includes both professional care and informal care interventions to improve the quality of life for the patient post-stroke. Care coordination can help develop insights into the healthcare system with implications for healthcare policies.

References

Boehme, A. & C. Esenwa, M. E. (2018). Stroke: Risk factors and prevention. Journal of the Pakistan Medical Association, 60(3).