Health Care Management
For this assignment, please use the template provided to answer the questions below. These questions are based on the following case study, and the answers to these questions can be found in this week’s textbook reading as well as the articles below on Maslow. You will learn that just like individuals move along a health continuum, they also move along Maslow’s hierarchy depending on what their needs are.
Review the following articles:
The two basic needs—physiological (or biological, such as breathing, sleeping, and so on) and safety (such as health)—are often at the root of anxiety, frustration, anger, or fear. Once you understand that a person’s reaction is based on a physiological or safety need, it is often easier to respond to them and ease their concerns. Focus on these two needs for your assignment.
- Physiological needs: These are biological requirements for human survival (e.g., air, food, water, shelter, clothing, warmth, and sleep). If these needs are not satisfied, the human body cannot function optimally. Maslow considered physiological needs the most important because all of the other needs become secondary until these needs are met.
- Safety needs: Once an individual’s physiological needs are satisfied, the need for security and safety become salient. People want to experience order, predictability, and control in their lives. These needs can be fulfilled by family and society (e.g., police, schools, businesses, and medical care).
Case Study
Mary Smith handles the billing for Dr. Major’s busy primary care practice. Patients are sent to Mary to give her information about their insurance coverage, to make payment arrangements, and to pay their portion of office visits. One day, she is collecting a payment from an elderly patient, Mr. Lee, who came to Dr. Major for treatment of arthritis. He moved to the United States from a small island in China a few years ago. The patient is visibly upset. Mary asks if Mr. Lee is all right. He says, “Everything here is so rush-rush. The doctor has no time. How am I supposed to feel better if I can’t spend enough time with the doctor?”
When answering the questions below, please know that Mr. Lee has not been sleeping well and has been ill for some time. How would you respond to the questions below knowing what you know about Mr. Lee and Maslow’s theory? There is no need to cite the article or text.
Use this template to answer the following questions:
- How can Mary appropriately respond to the patient, knowing that he has been ill for a while (safety need hasn’t been met) and he hasn’t been sleeping (physiological or biologic need hasn’t been met)?
- Are there questions she might ask him to learn more about his feelings?
- Are Mr. Lee’s human needs being met per Maslow’s Hierarchy of needs? If not, how can Mary help to address his needs in the answer that she provides?