This week you read about the big three settings (primary care, hospitals & long term
care) in U.S. health care that interact with and are influenced by many different facets of
health care systems: financing, technology, workforce, quality improvement, etc. This
week I would like you to do a little creative thinking based on the readings.
Please pick from the lists below a) a geography type; and b) a population. Then you are
going to pretend you are representing that population in that geographical area – for
example, seniors (65+) in rural Oregon – to advocate for a health care system that best
meets their needs.
Based on the information you read in the text (and supplementing from outside
resources may be quite helpful here), choose at least one health care delivery setting
and use your discussion to advocate for what elements of that setting are most
important for your population in that geographical area in relation to your care setting.
You can also include what is not a priority to your population. I am not looking for a
correct answer, I am looking for you to make the case and explaining what you are
saying with evidence to support it.
For example, if my population is seniors in rural Oregon, I might say that in primary
care, having access to outpatient long term care as well as mobile primary care could
really help serve my population’s needs due to their lack of mobility/access to
community resources and their increasing need for health services as they age. I could
also talk about how technology can support my population’s primary care needs through
the use of telehealth. If I had chosen hospitals as my care setting, I might talk about a
concern that hospitals are becoming increasingly for-profit, and my population is likely
going to need more hospital services as they get older, and how do we consider the
costs in a for-profit vs. community setting with a population where most residents likely
live on a fixed income? Your answers will be longer than this (and cited), this is just to
get you going. Think about how your population will access care, what types of services
they might be most likely to need, what their financial issues might be (if you know),
other factors not directly related to but affect accessing care, etc. In your answers, I
want you to make sure you are tying your ideas directly to concepts discussed in the
text – e.g., technology, workforce, cost, etc.
Choose a geographic area:
1. City of Portland – large urban area
2. Metropolitan county outside of Portland
(Clackamas/Multnomah/Washington/Lane etc.) – smaller urban or suburban
area
3. Eastern Oregon – rural/frontier area
Choose a population:
1. Young children (ages 0-5)
2. School-aged youth (ages 5-21)
3. Non-English speaking Oregonians
4. Seniors (ages 65+)
5. Low-income families
6. Houseless Oregonians
Choose a setting:
1. Primary care
2. Hospitals
3. Long term care
In addition to the prompt, also include:
● In light of the longer prompt for the week, you do not need to include a key
concept. Please note that the 2 points usually allocated to key concept
discussion will be included in your response to the prompt questions.
Because of this, 8 of your 12 points for this discussion post will be based on
how completely/thoroughly you respond to the prompt. Please read the
directions thoroughly and email me with any questions in advance of the due
date.
● At least one question related to the material that you would like to discuss
with your team members. Remember, this question does not need to have
one, finite answer, however it should be more engaging than a yes/no
response. This question is what your team members will be responding to in
their forum responses, so be considerate of what is a reasonable, engaging
question.
Posts are due by Thursday, 5/9 at 11:59pm. You also have a forum response due this
week, you will be responding to at least one of the week 5 forum posts.
Your post should be between 250-500 words, though this week I expect them to be
closer to the 500 word end of the range as it would be exceedingly difficult to
thoroughly respond to the prompt in less than that. This equates to approximately
two pages when double-spaced. Discussions should have a minimum of two references
back to the course material and all references must be appropriately cited (APA format)
and a reference list provided. You’re welcome to pull in outside material this week as
well.
Post due Thursday 5/9
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