Approaches to improve the delivery of care
Almost any short visit to your nearest hospital will leave you with the notion that something here can be done better. Waiting times abound even though many people seem to be doing nothing. Patients spend hours in a waiting room to get into the Emergency room. Patients spend hours waiting in the ER to get …
We need a process to improve a healthcare process Read More »
At some point during the first session of our courses on Operations Management, Process Improvement, or Managing Health Care Processes we find the need to understand and utilize Little’s Law. This refers to anobservation by John Little which states that the long-term average number (L) of flow units in a stationary system is equal to the long-term average, …
Imagine you are a new Physician working in a group practice as part of an Academic Medical Center (AMC). You may be surprised to learn that you are soon expected to play a leading role in managing the day-to-day process flows of the clinic. This may sound strange since you are the newest member of …
I once had a student in my course on Improving Healthcare Processes tell me that since they were pregnant they would look for a hospital that was not an Academic Medical Center (AMC) because, “Everyone knows that the AMC has to be less efficient.” I didn’t want to debate the point at the time. Healthcare, …
Everybody Knows the academic hospital is less efficient – right? Read More »
Among my varied adventures as an undergraduate student at Virginia tech was my time spent working in a small pizza restaurant. In the role, I was often assigned to come in before the restaurant opened and do “prep work.” This consisted of filling containers with chopped ingredients, pulling dough to thaw, and placing utensils and …