The value of health care — defined as the health outcomes achieved relative to the costs invested — is an increasing concern in the United States. Health care spending is expected to accelerate over the next 5 years, reaching 20% of the U.S. gross domestic product by 2025. Quality of care and health outcomes remain […]
Over half of public hospitals in the United States have adopted the “Lean” management strategy, leading to improvement in financial performance and efficiency, reports a national survey in the November/December issue of the Journal of Healthcare Management, an official publication of the American College of Healthcare Executives (ACHE). The journal is published in the Lippincott portfolio by Wolters Kluwer. Although Lean […]
John Toussaint, MD, sat down with Marcel Kuhn Bamert, Lean Manager of the ‘Kantonspital Graubünden’ (KSGR), from Switzerland about lean transformation in healthcare. See full interview
We recently held a webinar with PCPI that discussed: PCPI’s role in quality management Utilizing clinician level performance measurement for process improvement PCPI’s current policy work in various areas, including interoperability and physician fee schedules Closing the referral loop in ambulatory care PCPI® is a consortium of diverse organizations dedicated to improving healthcare quality, safety, and […]
Traditional healthcare management needs an overhaul. Medical errors have become a norm and costs continue to escalate. A new management philosophy is emerging at a few NHS Trusts. Recent research has shown that operational excellence, the management approach described in this article, leads to improved patient cost and quality outcomes. However, it requires healthcare leaders […]
Abstract: It is well known that health-care performance is highly variable and not reliable. To address this issue, a number of health-care leaders have been experimenting with operational methods derived from non–health-care industries. Leaders at Stanford Hospital and Clinics, Stanford Children’s Hospital at Stanford, and ThedaCare have been studying and applying principles from consistently high-performing […]
Quality improvement (QI) methods have been introduced to healthcare to support the delivery of care that is safe, timely, effective, efficient, equitable and cost effective. Of the many QI tools and methods, the Plan-Do-Study-Act (PDSA) cycle is one of the few that focuses on the crux of change, the translation of ideas and intentions into […]
Given pressures to control costs and improve quality of care, one of the most prevalent transformational performance improvement approaches in health care is Lean management. However, the roles of support functions such as human resource (HR), finance, and information technology (IT) in Lean management and the relationships of these support functions with performance are unknown. […]
Organizational culture is the essential element in meeting health care goals, according to Stephen Swensen, MD, Professor Emeritus at the Mayo Clinic College of Medicine and Senior Fellow at the Institute for Healthcare Improvement. “Culture, more than anything else, drives performance,” he says. “Culture is the way in which organizations make decisions about what they […]
Mark Granabn’s Lean Blog Episode #338 is Mr. Grey Dube, the Chief Executive Officer at Leratong Hospital. He has over 40 years’ experience in the public service, including time as CEO at the hospital since 2005. Leratong Hospital is an 855 bedded regional hospital with over 1700 staff members, located in Mogale City, Krugersdorp, South Africa (just […]
