Health Management and Planning

What You Will Learn

After reading this note, you should be able to...

Management is the attainment of organizational goals in an effective and efficient manner through planning, organizing, staffing, directing and controlling organizational resources.
Organizational resources include men (human beings), money, machines and materials.

Louis E Boone & David L Kurtz- The use of people and other resources to accomplish objectives.
Mary Parker Follet- the act of getting things done through people.
Frederick Taylor defines Management as the art of knowing what you want to do in the best and cheapest way.

Programmed
Nonprogrammed
Mechanistic-It is one that is routine and repetitive in nature
Analytical-It involves a problem with a larger number of decision variables
Judgmental-It involves a problem with a limited number of decision variables, but the outcomes of decision alternatives are unknown
Adaptive-It involves a problem with a large number of decision variables, where outcomes are not predictable

A plan is a course of action one intends to follow to solve a problem. It ensures that objectives are set to deal with problems and to make best use of available resources.
A plan also provides the opportunity to consider all the options available for the performance of tasks in response to needs.
Planning is determining the objectives and formulating the methods to achieve them. It is more simply said than done. A job well planned is half done.
During planning one needs to ask oneself the following:

Planning may focus on achieving changes in

The characteristics of individuals (such as knowledge, attitudes, health risk behaviour / practices and health status).
The characteristics of groups or organizations (such as cost, availability and quality of services)
The physical, economic, legal and social characteristics of the environments in which people work or live.

Where are we now? – Assessment of the current status.
Where do we want to go? – Identification of the desired sate in the future (Priorities, Goals, Targets, Decisions).
How will we get there? – Specification of interventions and other activities that will affect the necessary changes to achieve the new desired state (Organization and Management).
How will we know when we arrive? (Evaluation).

Necessary information obtained by collecting and analysing data.
Identifying the desired future state is largely a matter of values and determining what should be done to effect the desired changes.
Requires expert knowledge of how organizations and health care systems operate and in-depth understanding of a community’s values, beliefs, politics and particular patterns of interaction.

The implementation stage will involve:

Population based planning – attempts to study the entire population of a designated region to specify changes in existing resources needed to meet the health service requirement of that population.
Institution based planning – involves determining what types and levels of service the institution (such as hospital, health maintenance organization or neighbourhood center) needs to accomplish its defined mission, and then proceeding to market services to the required client.
Program planning – is quite common and incorporates aspects of the other types of planning (e.g. AIDS prevention education, Guinea worm eradication, Polio eradication, etc.)
Strategic plan – long term (Top management)
Tactical plan – mid-term (mid management)
Operation plan – short term (operational level)
Rolling plan
Annual plan
Policies-general statement or understanding which guide or channel thinking in decision making
Programs-comprehensive plan that includes future use of different resources
Procedures-states a series of related steps or tasks to be performed in a sequential way
Budgets-statement of expected results expressed in numerical terms

Communicable Diseases e.g. Malaria, TB,
NCD— Hypertension, DM
Cancers
Prevention
Program planning– is quite common and incorporates aspects of the other types of planning (e.g. AIDS prevention education, Guinea worm eradication, Polio eradication, etc.)

Statement of goals – broad statements that define what the health program is expected to accomplish.
Objectives – specific statements of activities and outcomes needed to reach a goal including time frame, a strong verb, a single purpose and a single result or end product.
Methods and activities – the means through which the changes will be made. Activities describe the specific things that will be done to implement the change. Methods identify the vehicle for change – mass media, regulatory legislations etc.
Resources and constraints – resources that are available that will be used to bring about a change while constraints are forces expected to work against the program.
Implementation plan – procedures for introducing the program to the target group.
Evaluation plan – procedures for the collection and analysis of information to determine program performance.

Check how well you grasp the concepts by answering the following questions...