Maintenance Policy and Repair – Need and its Importance
Introduction Plant and machinery in the initial days always perform to their fullest capacity but as time goes with regular wear and tear, this becomes increasingly difficult. If proper and regular maintenance is undertaken than production capacity can be maintained at a more or less same level. Maintenance also requires replacement decisions. Replacement is a […]
Materials and Resource Requirement Planning – Objectives, Advantages and Disadvantages
Introduction Success of an operation department of any organization is dependent upon an efficient production plan. One of the key essential of a production plan is material and manufacturing planning system. Material requirement planning plays a pivotal role in assembly-line production. Material requirement planning is a system based approach, which organizes all required production material. […]
What is Globalization ? – Meaning and its Importance
We often hear the word globalization in many contexts and repeated frequently as a concept to denote more trade, foreign companies and even the ongoing economic crisis. Before we launch into a full-fledged review of the term and its various manifestations, it is important to consider what exactly we mean when we say globalization. Globalization […]
What Caused the Global Economic Crisis ?
The previous article in the module introduced the global economic crisis with a brief overview of the causes. This article looks at the causes of the global economic crisis in depth. For starters, the global economic crisis carries a distinct “Made in the USA” tag which means that the origins of the crisis are to […]
Early Bird Catches the Worm: Why First Mover Advantage Matters to Everyone
What is the First Mover Advantage? In business, as in life, being early and being first to launch products, enter markets and an agile and flexible approach to being there first matters. As the saying goes, The Early Bird Catches the Worm, the first mover advantage is indeed significant and matters to everyone, including businesses, […]
A well functioning healthcare system encompasses the principles of diligent and reliable care, attentiveness to the patients and compassionate service from the caregivers, and most importantly accountability on the part of the healthcare providers.
Taking the last aspect, which is the accountability of the healthcare providers, it is very important for any healthcare system in any country around the world to be accountable for the care that its practitioners provide. The definition of accountability in healthcare is that the practitioners and the facilitators of healthcare have to be held responsible for any lapses in the healthcare provided and have to be accountable for the outcomes of the treatment that they provide to the patients.
Of course, accountability does not mean that every patient who does not recover or where the outcome of the treatment is negative has the right to hold the healthcare provider accountable.
In other words, accountability in the healthcare sector is all about how the treatment and the healthcare provided to the patients is free from medical lapses, errors in judgment, failures of the doctors and the clinical personnel, and inadequate and late treatment of the patients.
To elaborate, a well functioning and successful healthcare system has to be accountable in the courts of law where the case against the healthcare providers by the aggrieved patients or their relations has to stand the scrutiny of the laws of the land and malpractices punished.
If we survey the principle and practice of accountability in the healthcare sector around the world, we find that the West is miles ahead of other regions in the world as far as accountability of the healthcare providers is concerned.
Of particular note is the practice of accountability in the United States where the healthcare providers are always alert and vigilant to possible malpractices and negligence, which can result in expensive lawsuits, and possible jail terms when the doctors and the clinicians are found guilty.
Even in cases where patients fail to prove negligence in a court of law, it is often the case that the bad publicity that the healthcare providers get from the trials acts as a deterrent. Of course, this does not mean that the healthcare system in the US is perfect and free from medical malpractices as the patients or their relatives often find it hard to fight the barracuda of lawyers who are at the disposal of the healthcare providers.
Indeed, the fact that many healthcare providers often get away in the lawsuits because they have access to the best legal luminaries in the country is one reason why the United States takes the medical malpractice lawsuits seriously and the judicial system makes all possible efforts to mediate between the healthcare providers and the victims to settle the dispute in an out of court settlement.
However, the situation in many regions of the world including Asia is pathetic as far as accountability of the healthcare providers is concerned. In many developing countries, it is not often that we find the patients or their relations taking the doctors and the clinicians to court even though there are thousands of malpractices that occur in these countries.
The reason for this is the lethargic and the tardy judicial system which when combined with the fact that most doctors and clinicians in these countries are well connected and are powerful means that there is lot of pressure on the patients and their relations to desist from legal action and instead, reach a compromise with the hospitals. This aspect needs to be remedied urgently as medical malpractices rank next only to premeditated crimes in their effect on the victims.
Further, with many countries in Asia opening up their medical sectors to medical tourism, the sooner the laws and the judicial system are reformed to allow and enable patients and victims recourse under the law, the better it is for these countries in their efforts to woo foreign medical tourists.
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What the Current Wave of Protectionism and Populism mean for the Future of Globalization and Free Trade
February 12, 2025
