DETERMINANTS OF QUALITY HEALTHCARE DELIVERY IN THE NORTHWEST TERRITORIES: A CASE STUDY OF PHARMACEUTICAL SERVICES DELIVERY IN INUVIK BEAUFORT DELTA REGION.
Briefly describe the background to your research. What contexts will you be looking at, and which specific organisations?
BACKGROUND:
HC delivery is AN ESSENTIAL AND IMPORTANT PART OF ANY SOCIETY, available to everyone but to what extent is the service meeting the needs of the people?
Research problem and questions (400)
State your research problem and research questions clearly. You should express your research topic in the form of a problem which needs solving, a question that needs answering or something which you find exciting and has aroused your curiosity.
Then break down the overall research problem or question into specific research questions that you think will be actionable in your research.
RESEARCH PROBLEM AND QUESTIONS
Inefficiencies due to poor communication, differentiation in the use of technological tools by the various service provider and lack of coordination. Lapses exists due to the fact that these service providers are infact different entities and work for different organisations but work collectively to deliver public health product to the community
- Challenges arise when patients are transferred from a remote community to a regional hospital and there is a break in service delivery due to the lack of the patients’ medication history.
- Patients are required to come to these health facilities with all their medications and if for any reason they are medically evacuated due to an emergency as is always the case, more often than not, remembering to pick up the patients medications will be the last thing on a frantic caregivers list of priorities.
- Patients then present in the health facility with no up to date medication record and the healthcare professional has to rely on the patient’s pharmacy to be able to do a medication reconciliation report.
- What if the patient uses more than one pharmacy
- Would it not be easier and more efficient if the entire territory has an operational process that ensures that all medical information are collated in one pool and can be disseminated at will when required?
- What role does a lean method operation processes play in achieving an optimum utilization of electronic medical records or other technological tools?
- How do we identify the bottlenecks in this operation’s process flow?
- What can be done to relieve the pressure or overload at these bottle necks?
- Technology tools? How do they play a role in optimizing the system process?
Research objectives (100)
What objectives will your research attempt to fulfil?
RESEARCH OBJECTIVES
This research aims at evaluating the healthcare services received or provided using the generic performance objectives of quality, speed, dependability, and quality, leaving out the cost parameter as it does not apply here and because it is relative to the individual depending on what insurance is available to him/her.
Research strategy and methods (including access) (300)
Outline your research strategy. Provide some preliminary ideas about where your data will come from you will obtain your data. Do you anticipate any difficulties with access? References (these are not included in the word limit) We do not expect to see many references at this stage but include whatever you actually use.
RESEARCH STRATEGY AND METHODS
- Theoretical frameworks:
- Conceptual frameworks:
- Questionnaires to be given out to pts in the two community pharmacies in Inuvik.
- Performance charts plotted against a standard.
- The four Vs of the operations of two community pharmacies in Inuvik, comparing with that of a community pharmacy in another province – Alberta.
- How the four Vs affect the cost of production, and hence the quality of the services that is provided.
- Problems or challenges anticipated: perhaps the hospital in collection of information?
- The place of lean as a concept of operations that emphasises on the: the elimination of waste, the involvement of everyone stakeholder within the healthcare delivery operation, as well as the concept of continuous improvement. With lean principles it is possible to meet the unique specifications and needs of our clients and to deliver on values.
