Potential measures for managing risks

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Based on the strategic and business plan is that Diabetes is one of the most terrifying healthcare conditions that affect vulnerable people in Jefferson County (Spears, Guidry & Harvey, 2018). The eight percent diabetes prevalence compared to the state’s average is an indication of great risk in some decades to come. The most affected individuals are the minorities from African American and Latino with a diabetes prevalence of fourteen percent. Based on the research done by community Health Needs Assessment (CHNA), associate the high diabetes prevalence to poor physical environments, poor nutrition, availability of fast-moving products, and lack of body exercise. Through the preparation of business and strategic planning, I have identified various risks that may obstruct the Center for Diabetes Care from achieving its goals and objectives.

First, the center will experience financial risk during its operations. In my analysis, I have noted the healthcare facility is spending much of its resources on salary payments. The other challenge might occur when the key financiers may fail to support the program if they realize fund mismanagement in the center. I recommend proper financial documentation that ensures some employees are held responsible and accountable in case of any case of funds embezzlement to ensure financiers remain committed in the center. I also recommend the facility to adjust their employees’ salaries to save funds for the center’s operation in case of key donors to withdraw their contribution to the center.

Secondly, the facility may face risks of heavy penalties from The Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) if the patients’ data is compromised. The facility lacks a digitalized system for gathering, analyzing, and storing patients’ data to ensure easy retrieval of the history of patients when needed by healthcare professionals. I recommend the facility to invest in the Electronic Health Record (EHR) system (Shefer, Atkinson, Friedman, Kuhar, Mootrey, Bialek & Lorick, 2011). EHR will enable the facility to comply with the rules and regulations for protecting the patients’ information as outline by the HIPAA. The EHR will also ease the process of collecting, analyzing, storing, and retrieving the patients’ information.

Thirdly, the center may face risks of limited professionals in the future. Training all staff concerning operations of the center may pose a challenge since most of the employees are employed on temporary terms. Various competitors are always on the lookout for already trained professionals to better their organizations. Therefore, I anticipate a challenge of non-permanent employees using a lot of the organization’s resources for training but later leaving the facility to go and offer services for competitors with better employment terms and conditions. I recommend the facility to extensively train employees who are permanently employed to save the considerable fund for the facility’s expansion than training all the employees.

Fourthly, the center may fail to prevent and reduce diabetes and its complication to the most vulnerable communities such as Hispanic, Latino, and African American population which it’s the center’s main goal. Since most of the minority groups are low earners may be unable to cater for diabetes services in case the facility’s donor withdraw from offering contributions hence the cost of medical services increasing. Thus, the facility will end up offering medical services to the white communities who are financially stable hence failing to offer medical services for the most vulnerable which its main goal. I recommend the facility to charge medical services to the most financial individuals while offering free services to the most unfortunate community in Jefferson County. The process will enable the facility to create an extra pool of funds to cater for operational costs in case donors fail to support the program.

The other risk is the ever-increasing production of fast-moving food and lacks of body exercise. The fast-moving food is very cheap and saves costs associated with the preparation of traditional meals (Lee, Willig, Agne, Locher & Cherrington, 2016). The fast-moving food from many companies constitutes of chemicals and high sugar content which is a contributing factor for diabetes. I recommend the center to conduct community-based education programs that will enlighten the community on the effect of consuming fast-moving food and the importance of exercise.

References

Lee, L. T., Willig, A. L., Agne, A. A., Locher, J. L., & Cherrington, A. L. (2016). Challenges to healthy eating practices: a qualitative study of non-Hispanic black men living with diabetes. The Diabetes Educator, 42(3), 325-335.

Shefer, A., Atkinson, W., Friedman, C., Kuhar, D. T., Monterey, G., Bialek, S. R., … & Lorick, S. A. (2011). Immunization of health-care personnel: recommendations of the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP). Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report: Recommendations and Reports, 60(7), 1-45.

Spears, E. C., Guidry, J. J., & Harvey, I. S. (2018). Measuring Type 2 diabetes mellitus knowledge and perceptions of risk in middle-class African Americans. Health Education Research, 33(1), 55-63.