Accountability: Health Program and Evaluation

Health Program and Evaluation
Student’s Name
Institution
Health Program and Evaluation
Accountability is an important concept, especially in health governance. Simply, accountability is a concept that that is based on the premise that individuals, communities, and government actors are responsible for their actions and consequently, should be answerable to others (National Academies Press, n.d.; Marston et al., 2020). In healthcare, accountability plays a fundamental role in promoting health equity. The World Health Organization (2019) posits that by engaging with accountability mechanisms, communities and governments can achieve health equity by identifying and addressing gaps that arise from discrimination in the healthcare sector. However, this can only be achieved if proper monitoring and evaluation of health-related programs are implemented.
Accountability in the context of health-related government programs can be accomplished through program evaluation. According to the University of Kansas (UOK) (2018), evaluation of health programs not only promotes communication among stakeholders but also facilitates the collection of feedback which ensures that there is accountability for program success and effectiveness. Four major elements are necessary for assessing and measuring accountability of health-related government programs (National Academies Press, n.d.). The first one is the existence/ creation of a body with a clear mandate to achieve the particular health objectives. This can be a government organization established by the department of health for the federal, state or local government. The second element addresses the capacity of the established body. The established body should have the capacity/ability to perform the required activities to accomplish the set goals. There is no use having a body that lacks the resources to perform its mandate. The third element is the ability to measure what the program has accomplished with respect to the set goals. For instance, if the goal was to improve maternal health among minority communities, then there should be clear and well-developed instruments for measuring what the program has accomplished concerning maternal health among women in minority communities. Finally, to assess and measure the accountability of health programs, tools for assessing and improving the effectiveness of programs should be made available. These tools should also help assess and improve the quality of the program (National Academies Press, n.d.). For accountability of health-related government programs to be measured, the program must be linked to the expected outcomes so that the impact can be determined.
As Joshi (2017) reveals, accountability in health-related programs is usually expected to bring positive outcomes as follows:
1 Promote better governance and enhance effective policy designs- Through this, necessary resources can be focused on improving healthcare and ensuring that there is adequate and equal access to healthcare for all communities.
2 Empower marginalized communities- Through accountability, resources are assigned to marginalized communities to ensure that they are receiving care that is similar to that of the majority.
3 Reduce corruption and misuse of public funds- The people responsible for formulating and implementing health-related programs are deemed responsible for the programs and are answerable to all stakeholders including the public. There is increased transparency on how resources are allocated and utilized.
4 Increase responsiveness to the needs of the public- Policymakers, government actors, and relevant service providers respond to the demands of the public when there is accountability. Ultimately, this promotes health equity and accessibility.
Most health-related programs usually have an impact. As Clarke et al. (2019) reveal, this impact can be positive, negative, intended, unintended, direct, or indirect. It is always important to evaluate the impact of a program through what is known as impact evaluation. The evaluation should focus on what the stakeholders want to know about the program. This way, they will clearly know what has been done and how t...