Hospitals
When most Americans think of a hospital, they do not make a distinction among the three very different and general types of hospitals that are in operation in the United States: public, for-profit, and non-profit. While all three types of hospital provides essential services, each kind of hospital focuses on providing their service in very different ways to a different variety of patients. There are also differences in where the hospitals are found, as well as the who the primary people to whom they provide service. The patients in each kind of hospital varies in terms of insurance level, household income, as well as coming from a wide variety of a demographics.
Despite the difference in organization, all three hospitals share many of the same objectives. They all utilize doctors seeking to remedy the illnesses which their patients present themselves. Just because a patient goes to a public hospital does not mean they are deprived of capable care. While for-profit hospitals have the more cutting edge technology, a public hospital is not hopelessly outdated. All hospitals also are seek to improve the care they provide on several fronts. There are six fronts upon which these hospitals seek to improve their care. The first is to provide more safe care, which means seeking to reduce both the volume and severity of patient injuries. They also try to provide more effective care, making the care they provide more effective means reducing the number of wasteful and unnecessary procedures, and only provide evidence based care. The third way hospitals strive to improve care is by making the care more patient based, ensuring that the care is attentive to the needs, desires, and values of the patient in their care. There is also an effort to provide more timely care, thus reducing the wait time for all services rendered. More efficient and less wasteful care is another goal. The final way they try to improve care is by making it more equitable, meaning that the hospital staff will make they care the patient receives ignorant of the gender, race, ethnicity, geographic location, primary language spoken, or socioeconomic status of the patient in their care.
All three kinds of hospitals are facing concerns of budgetary shortfalls and funding issues during this economic downturn. Every hospital is concerned about its ability to cover its own operating costs, as well as the declining ability of to receive payment for the services that they provide. There will have to be a wholesale change to the way that hospitals bill for the care they provide if they can help people in the future. It is possible that the passage of Health Care and Education Reconciliation Act by the Congress will have an impact by forcing the widespread enrollment of American into insurance plans, but changes will have to be more widespread. Some way will have to be found to lower the operating costs for hospitals, especially for public hospitals, if these primary care institutions are to continue to provide the essential service that treat Americans when they fall ill.