How well prepared you feel your agency is?

In my opinion, my agency is prepared for the accreditation because plenty of staff is available. Nursing staff as well as the helping staff is very hard working.  Documentation and data centralization are though not up to the mark but is available. Healthy environment is available and all people are of positive attitude.

Why are you proposing it?

Accreditation is essential for any healthcare setup. It strengthens the basis of your healthcare agency. In addition to strengthening the organization, it makes sure that your heath care services are working effectively and efficiently. It makes the high-quality care of supreme importance. Not only this, but it also makes any organization compliant with the laws and regulations. Moreover, it urges the organization to stay up to dated to meet the demands of changing times.

Accreditation also gives you chances of self improvement which in turn helps in up lifting of the name of agency or organization.

Therefore, I want national accreditation for my agency. Because I want my agency to up rise, and improve. Also, I want to improve myself in my skills and expertise. The process of accreditation is a process through which you have to pass after some interval. During this interval, you get a chance to raise the standards of your organization. Moreover, as you work your best in your organization and also you are certified, this enhances your confidence in addition to protecting faculty and the organization from the internal and external pressures of many kinds.

National Accreditation:

Accreditation is defined as official certification of some company, institution or individual by some regulator who isn’t related to that individual or company. It is an action taken to define status of someone or some organization. It also includes assignment of specific task to that company or that individual.

National accreditation process and bodies are of special interest and value. Certification of these bodies is done by non-governmental people; however connection of these people to the professionals of the agency or organization which are to be certified is compulsory. National accreditation agencies are not related to a region only but are “national bodies”. These bodies focus on the improvement of their expertise and reputation regularly, because these are investigated repeatedly for certificate renewal.

Accreditation of healthcare agencies, organizations and bodies is a process of getting the healthcare bodies certified and given a specific status. In addition, these are also assigned a specific task according to their specialty and expertise. (Geteducated.com, 2018)

What it costs?

There are two types of costs related to the accrediting process. These are:

Direct costs

Indirect costs

Direct costs are those which include the costs of surveys as well as the costs of the tours and trips

Indirect costs include all the prices and costs you have to pay while making preparations for the survey.

Not only this, but many a times hospitals and other related agencies have to arrange mock surveys before the actual survey, in the preparation of accreditation process. These surveys are quite time consuming and price consuming. In addition to it, in these surveys you also have to pay the fees of consultation services. Follow up of the cost surveys are quite cost demanding. And at the end the actual survey is the actual thing. Staff has to keep all the record and data of the agencies, this record keeping is quite time consuming. It also demands a lot of resources and money. Treatment planning of all the process in preparation of accrediting surveys also demands money.

Overall, direct and indirect expenses of accreditation process are in the form of money and time. But these expenses are worth paying for if you keep in mind the benefits of accreditation process. (Blog.tesu.edu, 2018)

What are the timelines of achieving it?

 Accreditation is a lengthy process. It consists of accreditation and re accreditation process. It involves many mock surveys and actual surveys.

Within a year healthcare agency should apply submit its documents to the national accreditation board for getting recognized. Public health accreditation board responds to these documents within a month at maximum. Afterwards, site visit team conducts the preliminary surveys and the healthcare agency is answerable to the questions asked by the site visit team. Site visit team is bound to visit within one month after response by the public health accreditation board. Then, within two weeks site visit team submits its report of the visit to the accreditation board. Afterwards, this report is reviewed by the accreditation board, final survey is made and name of agency is added in the accrediting agencies. Re accreditation occurs if first accreditation fails or after every one to five years for the follow up and renewal of the certification.

What the advantages are?

There are several advantages of the accreditation in a healthcare setup. These include advantages for the patients, advantages to staff and hospital.

In case of Patient, Accreditation makes sure that patient is receiving continuous care and is being transported safely. It focuses on the safety of patient and satisfaction of patient. It focuses on the pain management. Rights of patients are protected as well as respected through this. Satisfaction of patient is evaluated and respected. It makes sure the availability of high quality care, understandable ways and language of communication, privileged and expert medical staff.

Benefits that staffs enjoy due to accreditation are numerous which include the improvement of the professional medical staff, availability of education on the standards of consensus and availability of the fine leadership for the improvement in the organization overall. Furthermore, through this learning and because of the comfortable working environment a sense of satisfaction is created among the staffs.

Advantages to the hospital include not only the improvement in hospital care but the quality care. It raises the confidence of community in the hospitals when hospitals are engaged in quality care. It helps hospital to bring the best out of its management and expert staff.

Community gets benefit from accreditation due to revolution in quality, epidemic preparedness, and disaster management and by having access to a large amount of the database

What the challenges are?

Accreditation is the process of getting recognition for any hospital; it can be from the national accreditation body or from the international body. Accreditation process guarantees the improvement in the quality of patient care and the increased safety of the patient. It also works to gradually decrease the risks faced by the patients and the organization. However, in doing so and while accrediting, any organization and agency has to face a lot of problems and challenges.

Lack of team:

This process demands a core team with representatives of doctors, team of nursing staff  , housekeepers, pharmacist team , engineers , microbiologist and office team. This team needs full support from the higher authorities in order to achieve its task and do his duties to produce the desired results. (Accreditedonlinecolleges.com, 2018)

Environment Safety:

Hospital infrastructure should be improved to guarantee the optimal patient care and give security to the patient.  For safe environment proper fire norms should be available. Air conditioning system should be properly working.  Surveillance calendar should be available. Devices of patient availability like nursing units and proper care of sick patients should be available all the times.  HEPA filters in operation theatres, OT air conditioning and laminar flow should be under control. Goals should be set for safety of patients. Meetings should be arranged for the documentation of patients.

Inconsistent Process:

Standard operating procedures are required for the proper functioning of any setup. Lack of these SOPs in written as well as the practical form is a common problem encountered. SOP implementation is a basic requirement of any organization and should be given key importance.

Problems with documentation of National accreditation

Documentation is a major problem in healthcares setup. Incomplete discharge sheets, incomplete orders of medication and unsigned treatment orders are a big issue.  Higher authorities need to solve these issues keeping in mind the sensitivity of these issues. Incomplete checklists are another big problem and these come under the responsibilities of resident medical officer. Lectures should be arranged to emphasize the importance of the documentation and record keeping.

Non availability of trained staff of National accreditation:

Untrained staff is the biggest issue faced by the hospitals.  Lack of hospital staff training and individual departmental trained staff is a big problem. Getting the hospital employees trained is a tiresome task. To overcome this problem, mock drills, training sessions and workshops should be arranged.  Mock tests should be conducted as well to increase the compliance of staff.

Lack of laws and regulations of National accreditation:

Hospitals lack the central tracking of data. Renewing of pharmacies, blood bank licensing, infrastructure improvement, record keeping, and computerized data availability are not available in most of health setups. Authorities should take initiative in making these circumstances better. And all documents should be available when and if needed for the legal proceedings.

Management issues of National accreditation:

Time management is a big issue in accreditation process because there is fixed time for correcting the complaints of patients. In healthcare organizations on time work should be emphasized and should be the first priority of all the staff. Core team should also play the role of model in order to encourage them to work efficiently.

Audit team issue of National accreditation:

Audit team available to check the progress of hospital and compliance of staff to the accreditation guidelines should work in a way to create a positive environment within the hospital and among the staff. It is very important because it helps increasing the patient care, confidence of staff and safety of hospital. Solutions presented by the audit team should be easy and positive.

Inventory measures of National accreditation:

Identification of expired drugs, fresh drugs and near expiry drugs is a sensitive topic and major challenge faced by the doctors and hospitals. Large number of pharmacies and drug stores available across the hospital should be under the control of central store. Check up and cross check of these stores on daily and regular basis is very important.

In addition to these issues, there are many other problems like unavailability of equipments and poor nursing care etc. These issues can only be resolved if higher staff and juniors work hand in hand with each other.

What resources are needed?

The resources needed for the accreditation include a core team. Team which includes consultants, pharmacists, trainees, nursing staff, engineers, helping staff , clerical staff and workers. Information technology resources are needed for the centralization of all the data. Resources of money are needed in bulk to buy the instruments, care of the already available instruments, medications and for many more things. Governmental help is also required in form of money and moral support. Funding and charity is required to keep up with the expenditures of the hospital. The biggest resource and the most helpful one is in the form of time. (Cais.ca, 2018)

References of National accreditation

Accreditedonlinecolleges.com. (2018). National Accreditation. Retrieved from https://www.accreditedonlinecolleges.com/national/

Blog.tesu.edu. (2018). National vs. Regional Accreditation: Why Does it Matter? Retrieved from https://blog.tesu.edu/national-vs-regional-accreditation-why-does-it-matter

Cais.ca. (2018). Accreditation Resources. Retrieved from https://www.cais.ca/accreditation/resources

Geteducated.com. (2018). Regional Accreditation vs National Accreditation for Online Colleges7. Retrieved from https://www.geteducated.com/regional-vs-national-accreditation-which-is-better-for-online-colleges