Scenario: Now that you have identified the shrinkage and loss occurring within your organization, you are ready to determine which loss prevention strategies the organization should implement.Using th

Organizational Vulnerability Assessment

Nathan Bailey

SEC/240

Prof. Raymond Brown

July 16, 2018

Organizational Vulnerability Assessment

Part A

New York Presbyterian Hospital

One of the biggest challenges facing the United States healthcare industry today is the prevalence of medical errors. As a matter of fact, this is the primary reason as to why the concept of evidence-based practice has been introduced in the medical practice to prevent medical errors that are claiming lives of many people in the country today. New York Presbyterian Hospital is not exceptional or immune to this challenge. Past history shows that the hospital has fallen victims of erroneous treatment due to errors made during the admission and the subsequent procedures in the hospital.

There are a number of reasons as to why the New York Presbyterian Hospital is highly vulnerable to medical errors. To start with is because of lack of sufficient resources to acquire and establish appropriate systems to prevent the occurrence of medical errors. This is the primary basis of the evidence-based concept of healthcare management. Secondly, limited federal government support has triggered the hospital’s instability greatly when it comes to human and financial resources (Tan, 2018). Incorporating and compliance with the provisions of the evidence based practice concept can help the hospital to minimize medical errors.

Duke Energy

Duke Energy is a major power company in the United States. It provides electricity resources. The biggest vulnerability that this company is facing today regards upgrading grid infrastructure. It is important to underscore the fact that the United States has shown consistent efforts aimed at modernizing the country’s power grid system. This is in the efforts to make it smarter and as well more resilient in its undertakings.

The main reason behind this loss is because of the government policy and regulations. For instance, there are new laws on the maximum acceptable levels of pollution (Miller, 2017). The company is also obligated to comply with these laws despite the constrained timelines. This challenge can be addressed by conducting intensive research on the most innovative technological approaches aimed at making the operations of the company more effective and efficient.

American Water

American water is tasked with the mandate to supply water to the United States households. One of the biggest challenges that the company is vulnerable to is pollution. The company is vulnerable to this loss because of the rapidly increasing industrialization and urbanization that has seen water pollution reach dramatic levels. Remedying this specific loss necessitates establishment of water treatment plants across the country to purify the water and ensure that the water distributed to the people is safe and secure for people and animals to drink.

Part B

The provisions of medical service involve a very delicate procedure. A simple mistake made in any part of the supply chain could accrue detrimental consequences. New York Presbyterian Hospital’s supply chain is not very complicated as it involves four basic processes. This is basically the procedure of attending to the patients.

The starting point is admission of the patient. This is the initial stage and the patient’s details are recorded before they are ushered to the next stage. After the patient has been admitted, they are referred to a specialist or medical doctor depending on the problem they have. This is the stage where the assessment of their health condition is undertaken.

The third stage is prescription. This is the stage where treatment is conducted. For instance, if a patient needs a surgery, then it is conducted. If their medical condition is not that complicated, they are given prescription drugs and allowed to get home. The final stage is discharge. Once the patient has been treated, they make the necessary payments and they are allowed to go home. However, if their health condition features great complexity, they are advised to remain within the hospital’s premises for further care and observation by the medical specialists.

There are several threats to the supply chain of New York Presbyterian Hospital. To start with are information gaps. It is important to underscore the fact that being a federal hospital; New York Presbyterian Hospital is serving people of diverse cultures. This means that they bear different cultural practices and beliefs that would undermine the treatment process. Take for instance in the modern times when the government has emphasized the need for using data to inform healthcare decisions to prevent cases of medical errors. This has dealt a significant blow to the hospital because there are patients who are not willing to reveal critical information which is used in the delicate treatment procedures. Any form of medical treatment relies heavily on information. Lack of sufficient information due to some cultural barriers has undermined the efficiency in the supply chain of New York Presbyterian Hospital real time.

The second form of threat that has undermined New York Presbyterian Hospital is language barrier. Considering the fact that the hospital operates in a multicultural metropolitan environment, the issue of language barrier has largely undermined the treatment procedures (Jackson, 2016). This has been witnessed especially between the patients and physicians. Considering the fact that English is the universally accepted language of information exchange in the social settings in the United States, this had dealt a major blow when it comes to dealing with the patients whose English is their second language. This has further intensified the risk of misinterpretation.

It should be understood that a native’s language is not similar to that of the non-natives. Their interpretation of words and terms is totally different. This is another major factor that has contributed to the increasing medical errors significantly.

Finally, resource constraints have largely undermined the efficiency of the hospitals’ supply chain. For instance, as a result of the limited federal government support, New York Presbyterian Hospital has not been able to attend to all its clients on a daily basis. There are great numbers of patients that tour the hospital on a daily basis in need of medical services but their efforts have often been frustrated by limited number of attendants in the facility. More so, because of the resource constrains and human resources for that matter, the physicians are forced to give a single patient limited attention in order to attend to the more urgent cases (Ben, 2017).

Such a scenario that is being witnessed in the hospital today is largely as a result of insufficient resources to make its supply chain as efficient as possible. More so, resource constraints have seen the company become over reliant on the traditional approaches of information systems (Miller, 2017). This has increased the risk of security intrusions and malevolence access to the patient data. Issues of security breaches have denied the patients their right to privacy and confidentiality as enshrined in the HIPAA laws. This is another predominant blow that the hospital has to deal with to sanitize its operations.

References

Ben, J. (2017). Challenges and opportunities facing public utilities. Geneva: International Labour Office.

Jackson, E. (2016). Medical law: Text, cases, and materials. Oxford, United Kingdom: Oxford University Press.

Miller, F. (2017). Rights and Resources. S.l.: Routledge.

Tan, J. K. (2018). Medical informatics: Concepts, methodologies, tools, and applications. Hershey, PA: Medical Information Science Reference.