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Contemporary Healthcare Practices introduces learners to the foundations of modern healthcare systems and the professional skills required to succeed within them. Through an emphasis on equity, inclusion, and person-centered care, students explore the structure and function of healthcare communities and the roles of various team members. The text guides readers in developing effective communication strategies—both interpersonal and written—while fostering professionalism, ethical behavior, and cultural humility.
Learners will analyze the impact of customer service and patient experience, examine legal and confidentiality standards such as HIPAA and the Patient’s Bill of Rights, and practice problem-solving within healthcare contexts. The course also highlights the importance of self-awareness, emotional regulation, and respect for diversity in achieving positive outcomes for patients and healthcare teams alike.
Learners will analyze the impact of customer service and patient experience, examine legal and confidentiality standards such as HIPAA and the Patient’s Bill of Rights, and practice problem-solving within healthcare contexts. The course also highlights the importance of self-awareness, emotional regulation, and respect for diversity in achieving positive outcomes for patients and healthcare teams alike.
Course Competency 1: Examine healthcare communities
Learning Objectives:
- Explore the roles of various members of the healthcare team
- Explore career pathways in healthcare
- Explain the organizational structure of healthcare systems within the regulatory environment
- Describe the role and impact of major governmental regulatory healthcare agencies
- Examine the demographics of various healthcare communities
- Identify major trends in healthcare services
- Explore the impact of these trends within healthcare communities
Course Competency 2: Demonstrate professional behavior as a member of the healthcare team
Learning Objectives:
- Recognize ethical, moral, and legal standards
- Demonstrate time management techniques
- Present a professional image consistent with healthcare facility standards
- Model wellness behaviors and personal hygiene
- Exhibit characteristics of dependability and responsibility
- Demonstrate initiative
- Manage emotional response
Course Competency 3: Protect patient privacy and confidentiality
Learning Objectives:
- Explore various healthcare professional codes of ethics
- Explain the Patient’s Bill of Rights in various healthcare communities
- Identify privacy and confidentiality concerns
- Follow federal (HIPAA) and state privacy and confidentiality regulations
- Describe potential consequences for privacy or confidentiality violations for yourself and the organization
Course Competency 4: Demonstrate effective interactions in various healthcare settings
Learning Objectives:
- Demonstrate active listening skills
- Use professional language
- Adjust your dialogue to meet the needs of the audience
- Demonstrate awareness of the impact on nonverbal communication across culture
- Apply cultural sensitivity in your interactions
- Evaluate your ability to function as an effective team member
- Apply constructive conflict resolution skill
Course Competency 5: Integrate principles of customer service in the healthcare setting
Learning Objectives:
- Distinguish between internal and external healthcare customers
- Use a person-centered communication approach
- Examine the impacts of good and poor customer service
- Identify ways organizations measure customer satisfaction
- Describe the resources that improve customer service (interpreters, large-print materials, accessibility tools)
- Identify resources to improve culturally sensitive healthcare delivery
- Examine the impact of healthcare disparities and environment on customer service
- Explore diverse cultural health perspectives and their impact on healthcare delivery
Course Competency 6: Demonstrate effective written communication skills in healthcare settings
Learning Objectives:
- Document medical information appropriate for the intended audience and your scope of practice
- Document only relevant and necessary details
- Utilize medical language and avoid abbreviations, slang terms and emoticons
- Explore correct and appropriate punctuation, spelling, syntax and word usage specific to your target demographic
Course Competency 7: Apply an organized process to solve problems in healthcare
Learning Objectives:
- Identify the problem accurately
- Generate potential solutions for the problem
- Select a solution
- Generate a plan to implement the solution
- Evaluate the outcome
Course Competency 8: Demonstrate culturally mindful practices as a member of the healthcare team
Learning Objectives:
- Recognize barriers to inclusion such as subconscious/conscious biases, stereotypes, past experiences and the impact of social networks and the entertainment industry
- Examine aspects of diverse cultures, such as language, religion, spiritual practices, traditions, customs, beliefs and values
- Recognize how culture influences attitudes, behaviors, and expectations related to health, wellness and the provision of service
- Identify the impact of your values and beliefs on the healthcare system
- Demonstrate cultural humility to practice person-centered care
- Recognize the benefits of inclusive practice to enhance patient outcomes
This textbook is part of the WisTech Open collection and is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (CC BY 4.0).
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Under the following terms:
– Attribution — You must give appropriate credit to WisTech Open, provide a link to the license, and indicate if changes were made. You may do so in any reasonable manner, but not in any way that suggests WisTech Open endorses you or your use.
License: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
You are free to:
– Share — copy and redistribute the material in any medium or format
– Adapt — remix, transform, and build upon the material for any purpose, even commercially
Under the following terms:
– Attribution — You must give appropriate credit to WisTech Open, provide a link to the license, and indicate if changes were made. You may do so in any reasonable manner, but not in any way that suggests WisTech Open endorses you or your use.
License: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
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