Preparation In this assessment, you’ll assess the effect of the health problem you’ve defined on the quality of care, patient safety, and costs to the system and individual. Plan to spend at least 2 direct practicum hours working with the same patient, family, or group. During this time, you may also choose to consult with subject matter and industry experts. To prepare for the assessment:

Strategies for Improving the Quality of Care and Patient Safety

Healthcare facilities should ensure that quality care that improves patient safety is delivered. To accomplish this, they should embrace various strategies. Firstly, they should train healthcare providers on the management of AD (Galvin et al., 2021). Training creates a competent workforce committed to quality care and patient safety, and periodic refresher training should be provided for all healthcare providers. Also, comprehensive training should be provided to recruits. Secondly, healthcare facilities should develop standardized procedures for managing patients with AD. The standardized procedures should address aspects such as patient assessment and screening, patient and family education, and the formulation of evidence-based treatment plans (Galvin et al., 2021). Annual assessment of patients with AD will allow monitoring of cognitive function, behavioral manifestations, and the prognosis of the disease (Galvin et al., 2021). These findings promote an informed decision-making process regarding treatment and care plans. Patient and family education emphasizes adherence to the treatment plan. This is associated with optimized patient outcomes. Thirdly, performance evaluation will enable healthcare facilities to improve the quality of care (Galvin et al., 2021). Performance evaluation also enables healthcare providers to identify underperforming metrics. After that, they set goals aimed at improving metric performance.

Strategies for Reducing Costs

Healthcare facilities should embrace various strategies to reduce the healthcare costs of AD. The first strategy entails educating patients, their families, and the public. Availing evidence-based information to patients and their families will enable them to have better control over AD (Mok et al., 2020). For instance, patient education will promote adherence to care plans. This is associated with optimized patient outcomes, lower visits to the emergency department, and reduced hospitalizations (Mok et al., 2020). As a result, the cost of treatment is lowered. The other strategy entails optimizing clinical workflows. In this context, healthcare providers should embrace clinical decision support systems to formulate evidence-based treatment plans and embrace technology to mitigate medical errors. Optimized workflows improve the quality of healthcare services and mitigate unnecessary expenses incurred by medical errors and ineffective treatment plans (Mok et al., 2020). The third strategy is the adoption of alternative approaches to managing AD. For instance, cognitive stimulation therapy is a non-pharmaceutical technique that can be used to manage patients with mild to moderate AD (Mok et al., 2020). These techniques can substitute or complement pharmacological approaches in the management of AD.

Sources of Benchmark Data

The Alzheimer’s Association is a source of benchmark data on AD. It provides annual reports on various aspects of AD. Notably, it addresses the incidence and prevalence of AD, AD-associated morbidity and mortality rates, management of AD, cost of health care, and the impact of AD on society (Alzheimer’s Association, n.d.). Also, the association publishes reports on the awareness of AD. These reports enable healthcare facilities to make informed decisions and initiate pertinent strategies to manage AD. Furthermore, the reports enable healthcare facilities to evaluate the performance of their benchmark metrics and tailor individualized strategies to improve metric performance.

Part 2

I interacted with a seventy-four-year-old Hispanic American with AD. According to her family (spouse and two children), the patient was diagnosed with AD five years ago. They report that she has struggled with medication adherence for the past five years. Currently, she presents with muscle twitches, confusion, and vocalization of repetitive statements. Additional evaluation reveals that the patient experiences difficulty recognizing her children. The patient’s spouse reports that the patient has demonstrated anterograde amnesia over the past two months. Her thought process and impulse control are preserved. As such, the patient is likely to have moderate Alzheimer’s disease.

I spend four hours with the patient and her family. During our interaction, I learned that the patient did not adhere to the treatment plan. This is attributed to limited family involvement in her treatment process. We agreed that her family would be actively involved in her treatment process. The main barrier in my interaction with the patient and her family was health illiteracy. Further, I embraced active listening to interact with the patient and her family. Notably, active listening enabled me to get their buy-in and create a therapeutic relatio