As a healthcare professional, you strive to provide care in accordance with the latest evidence-based medicine. But reducing variability of care within your healthcare organization is also important not only to improve patient outcomes, but for the benefit of the entire organization and its employees, as well.
Variability of care, or inconsistent care practices, affects multiple aspects of healthcare delivery. By reducing variability of care, you can help in improving patient safety, reducing healthcare costs, and improving key performance indicators (KPIs) for both individuals and the healthcare system as a whole. A team approach can help you find viable solutions that can be easily implemented within your organization.
Factors that contribute to variability of care
Variability of care often boils down to two separate issues: operational variability and knowledge variability. Inconsistencies can occur in both of these areas and can span various practice areas and healthcare providers, including nursing staff.
Operational variability refers to differences in care delivered directly by nurses, doctors, pharmacists, and any other patient care providers. While each provider delivers care based on an understanding of the patient's diagnosis and treatment plan, there can be significant differences in the way care is actually delivered. In many cases, irregularities occur around a single activity somewhere along the care-delivery process.
In contrast, knowledge variability refers to differences in expertise among medical staff. This type of variability is often difficult to assess because it's based on an individual provider's educational and experience level. Knowledge variability can also be traced to the wealth of medical research occurring each year. It's hard to stay on top off the latest trends when recommendations for evidence-based practice change frequently.
Standardizing care benefits everyone
When care is standardized, patient outcomes improve. Recent research involving the implementation of care bundles to prevent surgical site infections (SSIs) demonstrated a significant reduction in SSI rates, compared with patients receiving non-standardized care. The study showed that SSIs occurred in 7% of patients receiving care according to a specific care bundle, compared with infections in 15.1% of cases in which care bundles weren't used.
In addition, delivering standardized care based on evidence helps keep costs down - for both patients and healthcare organizations. It's estimated that inconsistencies in care account for 14-16% of total healthcare spending within the United States. Developing methods for delivering consistent care could save hospitals anywhere from $50 million to $150 million.
