Effectiveness of Care Pathways in Ideal Hospital Management System: A Review

Hospital is the medical institution where sick or injured people are given medical or surgical care irrespective of their socio-economic status. Health care givers and administrators are considered as health care professionals. The form of hospital services, their organization, development, operation and administration have undergone significant differentiations during the last 20 years. Public dissatisfaction with the traditional role of hospitals has grown vastly which may be attributed to the implementation of issues such as changed quality of life and cost-effectiveness, wide media coverage of system inadequacies, increased demands and awareness of patient’s rights, limited resources in the era of expensive hi-tech medical support systems and traditional approaches of regulatory bodies. Hospitals across the country are searching for effective quality improvement strategies. Implementation of care pathways in the hospital management will improve the quality of care, standardization of care processes, bring into limelight the existing flaws, suggest ways for future improvements, help to utilize resources in a cost effective manner which is essential both in developed as well as developing countries. In this review attempts have been made to highlight on the strategic points like the implementations and utilities of clinical care pathways and its role in the control of emergency medical cases like strokes, importance of timelines and key performance indicators of health administrators, effectiveness of clinical decision making of medical professionals and their overall contribution in the quality improvement of health care and thus hospital management. © 2011 IGJPS. All rights reserved.