1. Using LEAN to Improve a Segment of Emergency Department Flow
- Author
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Courtney Vose, Christine Reichard, Susan Pool, Megan Snyder, and David B. Burmeister
- Subjects
Program evaluation ,Organizational innovation ,Leadership and Management ,health care facilities, manpower, and services ,Workload ,Emergency Nursing ,Efficiency, Organizational ,Patient Admission ,Task Performance and Analysis ,Health care ,otorhinolaryngologic diseases ,Inpatient units ,Humans ,Medicine ,Operations management ,Process assessment ,business.industry ,Process Assessment, Health Care ,social sciences ,General Medicine ,Emergency department ,Overcrowding ,Length of Stay ,medicine.disease ,Organizational Innovation ,United States ,Crowding ,population characteristics ,Medical emergency ,Triage ,Emergency Service, Hospital ,business ,geographic locations ,Program Evaluation - Abstract
Emergency department (ED) overcrowding is an organizational concern. This article describes how Toyota LEAN methods were used as a performance improvement framework to address ED overcrowding. This initiative also impacted "bolus of patients" or "batching" concerns, which occur when inpatient units receive an influx of patients from EDs and other areas at the same time. In addition to decreased incidence of overcrowding, the organization realized increased interprofessional collaboration.
- Published
- 2014
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