WHAT IS THE IMPORTANCE OF PROJECT MANAGEMENT IN HEALTHCARE?

Photo Reference: https://www.henryharvin.com/blog/project-management-used-in-healthcare/

There is so much more to healthcare than we know. As time evolves, there is no denying that everything around us progresses as well. In a hospital setting, factors such as patient satisfaction, improved facilities, and highly skilled workers are expected to grow with time. Standards will continue to arise and the healthcare industry would have to adapt to all of these. And this is where Project Management comes into the picture -they provide assistance to healthcare in planning, organizing, and overseeing projects that can improve the quality of patient care while being efficient and saving money all at the same time.

As per Teresa Knudson, Director of the Enterprise Portfolio Management Office at Mayo Clinic, now is the time where healthcare really needs to adopt better project management principles due to the continuous rise of internal and external challenges. She quotes, “You have to know what you’re doing and be better at it.”

To give a better light on the specific works done by Project Management in Healthcare, here are specific examples:

– Improving patient’s overall experience and satisfaction

– Expanding emergency services

– Implementing staff training

– Adding a new hospital wing

– Replacing hospital beds in rooms

Waterfall Project Management in Healthcare is the most common technique observed. It has a number of phases which is ideal because a new phase cannot begin until the prior phase has been completed. It also organizes projects in a sequential and linear process that inspires the name “waterfall” to this technique. This is often used in manufacturing and construction of brand new hospital equipment that is significant in modernizing medical treatments. For a specific example, if a hospital needs to build a new cardiac catheterization laboratory suite, there will be a need to have defined requirements and a timeline to commence at the onset of the project. Given that the project will need defined phases to be accomplished linearly, the waterfall method will be observed.

Photo Reference: https://www.hsph.harvard.edu/ecpe/a-primer-on-project-management-for-health-care/

There are more approaches to ensure the effectiveness and success of the projects in healthcare because ineffectiveness can lead to patients’ health problems getting progressively worse. Furthermore, in recent years in lieu with the COVID-19 pandemic, the importance of Project Management in Healthcare has become higher in consideration to newly arised issues that only the specific area can properly take care of such as:

– Budget cuts from government health programs

– Private insurance companies have compelled healthcare organizations to find ways to save money

– Modernized systems for electronic health records have become complicated and is always in need of continual monitoring and improvement

– New technologies also need tracking and improvement

– Brand new regulations continuously emerges

– There are greater inspections from outside groups such as the government, health insurance companies, and patients.

Project Management in Healthcare has also numerous benefits to improve healthcare and the industry. This area can improve the quality of care by improving processes used to prove that care, improve staff communication for patients, improve organizational planning, improve budgeting by directly aligning resources with important work, increase staff productivity, improve processes that decrease the risk of lawsuits, and improve relations with stakeholders.

It is safe to say that Project Management plays a huge role in Healthcare. It is the biggest factor in ensuring that the best and most quality medical assistance is given to patients and at the same time innovate medical technologies to improve patient care and treatments. Although it is not widely given recognition, project management is the silent worker that glues the healthcare industry together for the benefit of the entirety of the world population.

Reference: Tips for Healthcare Project Management. Smartsheet. (n.d.). Retrieved May

27, 2022, from https://www.smartsheet.com/content/healthcare-project-management