Instructions
Policy Issue Analysis
Students will select a healthcare policy issue with a bill introduced in a current Legislative session.
The bill can be at the state level if your home state Legislature is currently in Session. If your State Legislature is not currently, you will be required to select a bill at the Federal level in the U.S. Congress.
The 114th U.S. Congress began Jan. 6, 2015 and ends Dec. 2017. It is imperative that students select a bill introduced in the 114th Congress. The bill should introduced and currently making its way through the legislative process, but that has not yet passed or been enacted. When the 113th Congress ended in Dec. 2014, all legislation that was not acted upon “died”, so any legislation would be required to be re-introduced into the 114th Congress and would have a different bill number that the same legislation in the 113th Congress.
Based on your education, work experiences, and human nature, most of you probably already have opinions about many health care policy issues. A big challenge is to set aside your personal and professional opinions when analyzing health care policies in order to review the facts objectively. You need to gather the facts before you draw conclusions about the value of a policy.
Grading Rubric
/0.5 Introductory paragraph (one paragraph) There must be a thesis statement that tells the reader purpose of paper and what will be discussed.
/1 Problem Identification/Policy Problem Description – Describe the problem including information regarding causes and effects. Problem identification provides a reason for the work and sense of direction for evidence gathering. Avoid including possible solutions in your problem identification/definition.
Background Information – Include state/national perspectives with statistics, facts, figures, monetary data)
/2 *Social Factors – Why is this a problem? Who are those involved? How are they impacted? What is the incidence/prevalence? Include statistics on the numbers of people affected.
/2 *Economic Factors – Who does it cost? How much does it cost? Use specific $, %. #, etc. Include the impact of the problem as it relates to monetary costs, days lost in work, etc.
/2 *Ethical Factors – Discuss related ethical issues. Identify ethical principles being violated.
/2 *Political and Legal Factors – What legislative action has already happened at the state/national level? What was the impact? Litigation or court decisions? What do the different parties have to say about the issue? Is there bipartisan support? What is the impact of issue for both the legal and political arenas?
/1 Issue Statement (one sentence/question). Focus on the issue, rather than the topic, or a specific policy proposal.
/3 Stakeholders. Identify those individuals and groups with an interest in the outcome of the issue (those affected in any way). Identify those who will support and those who will oppose the issue and include their “stake”.
/1 Policy Option/Alternative – Provide the actual name and number of the bill and include a brief description of the bill. Discuss how the bill addresses the identified issue. The bill may or may not be the exact answer. You are looking to see what is available already, or what changes or revisions you might need to ask your legislator to include in the bill.
/6 Evaluation of Bill – Evaluative criteria are used to measure the outcomes and impacts of a policy alternative. Students will evaluate the selected bill based on the following three evaluation criteria: (a) effective, (b) efficient, and (c) equitable – using pro and con statements. The bill must have a pro and con statement for each evaluative criteria (effective, efficient, and equitable). Write pro and con statements using complete sentences. Use resources from the literature to support the pro and con statements and provide reference citations for each pro and con statement. Do not use the bill for reference for pro and con statements. All references should be included in Reference list. This rubric section will be submitted as an appendix using a table format (single space) as shown below (table format can be modified – this is provided as an example).
Policy Options/Alternatives
H.R. ABC
Evaluation Criteria Pro Con
Effective
Efficient
Equitable
/5 Results of Analysis & Summary: State whether you would recommend or oppose the bill based on the analysis. Make sure to back up your recommendation with the facts. Summarize the analysis of the bill based on each evaluative criteria (effective, efficient, and equitable). Describe how the bill does/does not improve the social, economic, and ethical, and political/legal factors. No bill is ideal or perfect – Discuss at least one (1) change or revision that needs to be included in the bill to improve the bills overall effectiveness, efficiency, and equability.
/2 Political Advocacy – Discuss two (2) methods on how you will communicate and advocate politically with your Legislators.
/0.5 Conclusions: summarize the essential points of paper in one paragraph.
/2 Talking Points (one page). Attach as an Appendix. Title talking points page with the name/number of the bill and include a brief description of bill. Single space and use bullet formatting. Use headings to introduce your talking points. Include at least 6-8 bullet points with reference citations and include the following:
At least 1 bullet states the problem or issue.
At least 1 bullet on national statistics concerning the number of patients/nurses the issue affects (Use state statistics if you selected a state bill).
At least 2 bullets on the impact of the problem as it relates to monetary costs, days lost in work, or pain and suffering for those affected are included.
At least 1 bullet addresses the estimated impact of the bill or an alternative solution to the problem if you are opposed to the bill.
At least 1 bullet addresses another point significant to the issue.
/30 Total Points
The paper should be written in a formal, scholarly style, and based on primary resources. Correct APA format is required. The paper should provide an organized flow, logical progression of ideas, and clarity in thought.
For a paper of this length, students are expected to use to use heading consistent with the rubric sections. In addition, students should follow the order of the grading rubric.
The paper should be 7 – 8 pages in length (excluding the Title page and Reference pages, and appendices).
References must be timely; published within the previous five (5) years. Liberal number of primary references (minimum of 12).
For submission: each paper should be “named” according to the File naming policy of the course.
Each paper, including the appendices, should be submitted to Turnitin.com. Remember to remove title page and reference list prior to Turnitin submission. A copy of the similarity report should be submitted with the paper to the Assignment section.
Submission instruction: each paper should be submitted in PDF format to the appropriate category of Assignments section. Your Turnitin report should be merged with your paper prior to submission. (There will be one document uploaded to the Assignment section.)
Up to 20% of the total points for this assignment may be deducted for an overall lack of scholarship to include: APA errors, grammatical e rrors, incorrect spelling, over the page limit, no Turnitin report merged with document, document not submitted as a PDF, not named appropriately, etc.
Assignments not submitted properly will not be graded. If this occurs, students will be notified via email and will have 24 hours to resubmit correctly.
You may see a resubmit button. Please understand that course policy does not permit resubmission of assignments; however, we have included this re-submission option for incidental mishaps occurring prior to assignment due date, such as someone forgetting to convert their assignments to pdf format, forgetting to merge turnitin report, etc.
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