NURS FPX 9904 Assessment 3 Doctoral Project Report

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Project Summary Report

The advancement of technology in the provision of remote consultations through telehealth has been a significant milestone in improving healthcare access, especially in rural areas. The title of the research is “Telehealth and its role in increasing patient satisfaction in rural communities” and this research seeks to establish the feasibility of Telehealth interventions to enhance patient satisfaction in rural areas. The kind of healthcare that is available in rural areas is severely limited, and these issues could be resolved by telehealth; however, there is limited data on its effectiveness (Smith et al., 2020). NURS FPX 9904 Assessment 3 justification for this study can be anchored on the fact that there is a necessity to avail substantive information on the research carrying out on the strengths and weaknesses of the use of telehealth within the conditions of rural setting healthcare facilities. The problem statement also highlights another area of dearth of research concerning the present study: telehealth and patient satisfaction in the above areas (Johnson & Green, 2019). This study has the potential to influence policy changes, making it a crucial area of study for telehealth services.

Background and Organization Gap Analysis

Telehealth has, therefore, become one of the revolutionary highlights in healthcare, especially in reaching out to rural-centered patients who face a lot of challenges in accessing facility-based in-person healthcare services. Telehealth is implemented to overcome this challenge by administering appointments, consultations, and monitoring without physical contact, NURS FPX 9904 Assessment 3 increases healthcare availability and flexibility (Smith et al., 2020). The challenges in healthcare provision in rural areas include rural physician shortage, Rural patient density, and constraints in the availability of rural health resources. These aspects predispose children to poor healthcare care gains and access compared to children in urban areas.

While the adoption of telehealth has received a lot of attention for improving healthcare access and promoting patient-centered care, research focusing on its effectiveness in enhancing patient satisfaction in rural regions remains scarce. Prior research has yielded somewhat equivocal findings, a few investigations reporting the advantages of telehealth in terms of increasing utilization and patient success, though various others pointing to important implementation issues – technological concerns, restricted net availability, and patients’ resistance to new technologies (Lee & Thompson, 2019). These disparities explain why the development of solution-based comparative studies is necessary to determine the extent of the impact of telehealth in rural healthcare organizations, taking into consideration patient satisfaction as a crucial factor.

Significance of the Practice Problem

Telehealth is now a mainstream part of the health care system, especially in view of the challenges rural populations encounter when it comes to obtaining conventional in-person care solutions. The first reason that makes the practice problem addressed in this study significant can be explained as follows: NURS FPX 9904 Assessment 3 practice problem that has been undertaken in this study is the effectiveness of telehealth in the perspectives of patient satisfaction in the rural geography context, which is considered vital for several reasons.

First, there is the poor provision of health care personnel, few health facilities and popcorn health posts of the rural health system, and poor access to health care services, which makes the rural population be worse off health-wise than the urban dwellers (Johnson & Green, 2019). Telehealth can help overcome these challenges in that its service deliveries are not constrained to requirements such as distant geographical location that prevents people in rural areas from accessing quality healthcare services (Smith et al. , 2020). The importance of this issue is even more paramount, given that past schemes have shown that patient satisfaction influences patients ‘health. Largely improved patient satisfaction is linked with better Patient Self-Management, increased Patient Activation, and consequently better health outcomes(Lee & Thompson, 2019). Hence, it is crucial to identify patient attributes and the comprehensiveness of telehealth services that may affect patients’ satisfaction with the delivered telehealth services in order to facilitate healthcare improvement strategies in rural areas.

Quality Improvement Framework

Telehealth is the focus of this study as it looks at the effect of telehealth on patient satisfaction in rural care centres in the United States of America, and the Quality Improvement (QI) Framework for this study is a framework meant to improve the quality and efficiency of telehealth services. As such, the QI framework encompasses the conventional best-known practices, which entails the constant enhancement and utilization of evidence in cases where rural health systems are faced with challenges in their practices (Brown et al., 2021). This fundamental eclectic framework invokes a number of models of which perhaps the most familiar is the Plan-Do-Study-Act or PDSA improvement cycle.

NURS FPX 9904 Assessment 3 Cycle’s Benefit

NURS FPX 9904 Assessment 3 cycle’s benefit of having iterative changes that are tested every now and then makes the whole process data-driven and specific for the rural healthcare environment (Garcia et al., 2020). The first phase of the cycle is the “Plan” phase, and this involves defining detailed goals for improving telehealth services aimed at increasing patient satisfaction and incorporating data gathered from surveys of patients and other stakeholders involving care providers, patients and other stakeholders at the healthcare facility.

In the “Do” phase, measures include improved education for health care practitioners, requisite and advanced equipment for telemedicine, and the promotion of patient awareness regarding programs and options. These interventions are to serve the purpose of filling perceived gaps in the service delivery to patients and improving patient satisfaction with the use of telehealth services (Walker et al., 2019). The “Study” phase aims to examine the efficiency of these interventions’ application with the help of quantitative measures, including patient satisfaction ratings, the frequency of such interventions’ use, and feedback from patients and healthcare workers.

Project Description

The purpose of the current applied doctoral research is to explore the roles and effects of telehealth on perceived satisfaction by patients within rural healthcare contexts. RHAs are stretched thin, often lacking proper medical personnel, infrastructure, and funding, and this has particularly been compounded by the distance and location of most patients in rural areas, often with worse health outcomes than those in urban areas(Johnson & Green, 2019). These disparities can be ameliorated using telehealth since this is a means of accessing healthcare services without one having to travel to receive them thus making the services easily accessible to the population of the rural areas (Smith et al., 2020). The main goal of the current systematic synthesis of qualitative and quantitative research is to assess patients’ satisfaction with telehealth services in rural areas. Perceived satisfaction has been known to be one of the key quality benchmarks since it helps to ensure that patients adhere to treatment, engage actively in the recommended treatment, and experience better health outcomes (Lee & Thompson, 2019). Given that patient satisfaction remains the core aim of this project, this intervention aims at generating tested and proven data on how useful telehealth technology is to the inhabitants of rural regions.

NURS FPX 9904 Assessment 3 Doctoral Project Report

Specifically, the study utilizes a mixed-method research approach that aims at achieving the following objectives: Quantitative data is obtained from a survey paper where patients were asked to rate their level of satisfaction with the telehealth service they used in a rural health facility. These surveys focus on patient satisfaction in matters concerning the usability, quality of services/ treatment offered, interaction with the healthcare providers as well as overall satisfaction with telehealth services (Garcia et al., 2020). The second type of data collection means focusing on more in-depth interviews with patients and healthcare practitioners, which would grant detailed ideas about their experiences, impressions, and recommendations for enhancing telehealth options.