Health Maintenance and Screening Plans
Clinical preventive services, such as routine disease screening and scheduled immunizations, are key to reducing death and disability and improving the Nation’s health. Yet, despite the fact that these services are covered by Medicare, Medicaid, and many private insurance plans under the Affordable Care Act, millions of children, adolescents, and adults go without clinical preventive services that could protect them from developing a number of serious diseases or help them treat certain health conditions before they worsen.
Discuss preventative services and ways to promote and overcome the barriers in your clinical practice to deliver holistic care including the recommended services for all patients across a lifespan. Please include examples, evidence-based information and references to support your work.
Expert Solution Preview
Introduction:
Preventive services are crucial for reducing fatalities and improving the health of individuals. However, despite being covered by various insurance plans, millions of people remain without access to these services. This discussion will focus on preventative services, ways to overcome barriers in clinical practice, and deliver holistic care while emphasizing the recommended services for patients of all ages.
Answer:
Preventative services are essential in clinical practice, and physicians must strive to offer them to all patients across the lifespan. These services include immunizations, routine disease screening, and other clinical preventive services that could protect patients from a number of serious diseases. However, several barriers may hinder the administration of preventative services in a clinical setting. These may include low awareness on the part of both the patient and physician, financial constraints, and time limitations.
Improve patient awareness can be achieved through effective communication and education regarding the importance of preventative services. Also, ensuring that patients have access to these services through insurance coverage can have a positive impact.
To overcome financial barriers, physicians should explore different payment options, such as co-payments and sliding scale fees. Furthermore, insurance policies should cover essential preventive services, as this can help patients benefit from them.
Time limitations can be a significant impediment to the provision of preventive services. Therefore, it is crucial to optimize patient wait times and schedule routine appointments to ensure that all recommended services are provided. Embracing scheduling models such as group visits or implementing strategies such as telemedicine can be useful in circumventing time limitations.
In conclusion, offering preventive services to all patients across the lifespan is fundamental. Physicians need to ensure that barriers to these services are overcome to deliver holistic care. This can be achieved by improving patient awareness, exploring payment options, ensuring insurance coverage, optimizing waiting times and scheduling routine appointments, and embracing telemedicine and group visit models when appropriate.
References:
1. US Preventive Services Task Force. Guide to Clinical Preventive Services 2014: Recommendations of the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force. Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (US); 2014.
2. Woolf SH, Braveman P. Where Health Disparities Begin: The Role of Social and Economic Determinants–And Why Current Policies May Make Matters Worse. Health affairs. 2011;30(10):1852-1859.
