Final answer:
A healthcare organization's performance improvement plan should include four main areas: Quality of Care, Patient Safety, Efficiency of Services, and Compliance and Risk Management. These areas work together to reduce healthcare costs, increase quality, and ensure the safe and efficient management of health records.
Step-by-step explanation:
The four main areas that must be included in a healthcare organization's performance improvement plan are:
- Quality of Care - This includes monitoring outcomes and ensuring that healthcare services meet certain standards and lead to improved patient health.
- Patient Safety - It involves creating systems and processes to prevent harm to patients and quickly address any safety concerns that arise.
- Efficiency of Services - This aims at optimizing resources and processes to reduce waste and improve cost-effectiveness in delivering healthcare.
- Compliance and Risk Management - Healthcare organizations must adhere to legal and regulatory requirements to minimize exposure to legal risks.
These pillars align with broader health system goals of reducing the cost of health care while increasing its quality. Effective policies should balance treatment costs, patient quality of life, and privacy risks when managing health records. Additionally, setting specific, measurable, achievable, relevant, and time-bound (SMART) objectives can drive improvements aligned with the overarching strategy of the healthcare organization.