Healthcare leaders have been touting evidence-based care to improve our nation's healthcare system as more hospitals and providers use algorithms to identify potentially high-cost patients, reports California Healthline.
But before hospitals fully embrace the data-driven approach to reduce costs and improve quality, they should be prepared to overcome three major barriers, notes the article.
Veteran healthcare professionals' opposition: Hospital leaders will have to confront veteran healthcare professionals who are skeptical of placing high-value on statistical indicators, and instead employ a combination of instinct and science.
Patient doubts: Hospitals must win over patient skeptics of evidence-based medicine. According to a 2010 Health Affairs study, many patients just don't understand the concept of evidence-based healthcare and worry that it would lead to reduced care. To start using evidence-based care at their facilities, hospital leaders must change the common assumption that more care is better care.
Unproven metrics: Medical data is not always clear, or worse, not always accurate, notes California Healthline. Add to that an Archives of Internal Medicine study that indicated publicly available physician data could not actually "predict which physicians will deliver high quality, evidenced-based care." Until hospital leaders know which metrics to measure and what those metrics mean, evidence-based care will continue to be a hard sell.
For more information:
- read the California Healthline article