Improvement Opportunities Identified Within a Specialty Hospital

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Improvement Opportunities Identified Within a Specialty Hospital

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Client: Specialty Hospital System
Industry: Healthcare
Service: Assessment/Opportunity Identification

Challenge:

Two-hospital system wanted to proactively prepare for the impending changes being brought about by healthcare reform
Wanted an overall evaluation of the hospital’s performance (encompassing all operations)
Improve revenue, decrease costs, improve patient satisfaction, and create a more quality-oriented culture

Solutions:
Rapid assessment led by experienced consultants:

Interviewed key staff throughout the system
Gathered data on process performance
Spent time on the frontline observing everyday work and challenges
Created impact estimates for all projects (on potential revenue, costs savings, etc.)

Results:

In less than a month, the organization had a detailed assessment along with a project action plan that identified dozens of specific projects that would meet one or more of the organization’s goals
Potential impacts were included in the final report so the organization could prioritize implementation

Faced with the impending changes in the healthcare industry, the CEO of a two-hospital system, which specializes in treating ventilator patients, wanted to evaluate the organization’s overall performance. With the imminent reductions in reimbursement and other reforms, he wanted help in identifying specific opportunities for improving performance, controlling costs, and enhancing revenues.

In less than a month, Guidon conducted numerous interviews, spent time in key departments, and collected data on process performance. Dozens of specific potential projects were identified, including focus in the following five areas:

Revenue enhancement. The hospitals generated all of their business through referrals from the 25 acute care hospitals in their area. Referral rates were inconsistent, however; documenting and transferring best practices could improve referral rates across the board. Also, “intake staff” who handled referrals were saddled with excess administrative paperwork. Removing waste could free up their time do more work on referrals.
Expense reduction/avoidance. An analysis of “a day in the life” of nurses and respiratory therapists revealed just how much time was consumed by activities other than patient care. Also, nurse staffing levels were out-of-sync with patient arrival patterns. Projects on reducing non-care tasks and creating flexible staffing to match demand would allow more value-added work to be done without increased expenses.
Patient satisfaction. Like most hospitals, this organization sent out follow-up patient satisfaction surveys four weeks after discharge, far too late to correct problems the patients encountered. Developing a system to generate immediate patient feedback could greatly increase patient satisfaction.
High performance culture. There was no system to provide immediate feedback or accountability to staff on tasks done correctly or incorrectly. Launching a management system to establish real-time feedback loops would allow for more learning and improvement.
Length-of-stay management. There was little proactive management around patient discharge dates, even though reimbursement was tied to target lengths-of-stay. A process was identified to improve pre-discharge planning (for transportation, e.g.) that could help the hospitals meet targets without endangering patient outcomes

The potential costs and impact of each opportunity was calculated using a common method. This is allowing the organization to map out an implementation plan, starting with the high impact/low cost projects (plus a few that have strategic importance but are most costly).