Loading

Letter to the Editor Open Access
Volume 1 | Issue 2 | DOI: https://doi.org/10.33696/haematology.1.007

Management of Diagnostic and Treatment Centers in the Second Wave of COVID-19

  • 1MA Student in Nursing, Faculty of Nursing, Islamic Azad University of Tehran, Tehran, Iran
  • 2Associate Professor of Health Services Management, Head of Innovation Center, Institute for Future Studies in Health, Kerman University of Medical Sciences, Kerman, Iran
  • 3PhD Student in Health Services Management, Faculty of Healthcare Management, Student Research Center, Kerman University of Medical Sciences, Kerman, Iran
+ Affiliations - Affiliations

*Corresponding Author

Khalil Kalavani, k.kalavani@kmu.ac.ir

Received Date: August 14, 2020

Accepted Date: August 24, 2020

Letter to the Editor

COVID-19 has challenged global health and affected many countries. The disease had infected more than 16 million people and killed over 650,000 ones by the end of July 2020. According to Sahu et al., COVID-19 epidemic is the third most common coronavirus in the 21st century, resulting in numerous deaths all over the world [1]. It has caused severe psychological stress and increased hospital visits along with increased tiredness and burnout of medical staff. The disease has also raised many problems for the management of hospitals and diagnostic-treatment centers, so that many of them have no capacity to receive patients [2].

Delivery of public services in diagnostic and medical centers is facing serious problems in emergencies, and there are often many challenges to provide services due to the lack of sufficient beds and equipment [3,4]. In this situation, management becomes much more difficult, and managers must be alert and forward-looking to do their tasks in the best way during the second wave of COVID-19. This definitely requires some skills. Given the fact that diagnostic and treatment centers are considered complex organizations, managers need to have various competencies, including general and technical ones, based on which they can perform their main tasks such as planning, organizing, directing, and controlling. The current situation of diagnostic and treatment centers has greatly highlighted the managers’ competence so that the proper and scientific management of the centers has become much more important. In this situation, managers should focus on the factors affecting the performance of diagnostic and treatment centers, monitor them, and not neglect them [5,6].

Given the possibility of the second wave of COVID-19 in any region and country, the most important factors needed to be considered by diagnostic and treatment centers managers are as follows:

• Staff training: Training and retraining of all the staff and updating their information is very important, and managers should plan and design various training programs for target groups so that the staff at diagnostic and treatment centers get ready to face the disease again at any time.

• Strategic purchases: There should be sufficient personal protective equipment as well as required devices and drugs in diagnostic and treatment centers, and using scientific principles of warehousing, managers should not worry about the supply of the equipment and pharmaceutical items.

• Hospital incomes and costs: Although incentive payments to employees have increased their motivation, excessive financial incentives are likely to raise staff expectations and cause problems. Hospitals’ income sources and the costs incurred during the first exposure to COVID-19 are significant, and managers can consider special plans to generate and gain new incomes and reduce costs.

• Hospital capacity: Due to the cancellation of elective operations and long waiting times during the first wave of COVID-19, it is important to consider how to continue the provision of elective services, and managers must have precise and flexible planning to not only provide their previous services but also to be ready to admit COVID-19 patients at any time in order to be able to provide their medical services to patients in the second wave of the disease.

If the managers of diagnostic-treatment centers neglect the above-mentioned factors, they will experience numerous problems in managing the centers. They need to manage the second wave of COVID-19 in the best possible way, so that human and other recourses and provision of healthcare services will face the least challenges.

Conflict of Interest

There are no conflicts of interest for the authors of this article.

References

1. Sahu KK, Mishra AK, Lal A. Novel coronavirus (2019- nCoV): update on 3rd coronavirus outbreak of 21st century. QJM: An International Journal of Medicine. 2020 Mar 3.

2. Peng J, Xu L, Wang M, Qi Y. Practical experiences on the prevention and treatment strategies to fight against COVID-19 in hospital. QJM: An International Journal of Medicine. 2020 May 5.

3. Cao Y, Shan J, Gong Z, Kuang J, Gao Y. Status and Challenges of Public Health Emergency Management in China Related to COVID-19. Frontiers in Public Health. 2020 May 29;8:250.

4. Iliopoulou K, Xyrichis A. Critical Care Telemedicine: A Management Fad or the Future of ICU Practice?. ICU Management & Practice, Volume 19 - Issue 4, Winter 2019/2020

5. Vincent JL, Creteur J. The hospital of tomorrow in 10 points. Critical Care. 2017 Dec 1;21(1):93.

6. Malmoon Z, Tourani S, Maleki M, Jafari M. Future competencies for hospital management in developing countries: Systematic review. Med J Islam Repub Iran. 2020 (3 Mar);34:15.

Author Information X