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Operations Management in Healthcare

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develop sound operations and manage for unexpected surprises. — location: 117 ^ref-48265

Excellent operations require a clear understanding of the nature of the work and how it is accomplished; — location: 124 ^ref-41960

analytical tools and methodologies to better — location: 129 ^ref-39955

anticipate and control the behavior of organizational members to perform effectively and efficiently. — location: 129 ^ref-9878

start with the issue the organization is facing. — location: 145 ^ref-20750

rein in their costs, improve quality, and sustain revenue streams, — location: 168 ^ref-1735

healthcare organizations have had to rethink the way they deliver care. This is where operations management (OM)—the art and science of making products or providing services—plays an important role. — location: 168 ^ref-46938

four competitive priorities of an operations strategy: quality, cost, on-time and fast delivery, and flexibility. — location: 173 ^ref-53112

the dangers of pursuing local optimization — location: 176 ^ref-5721

aligning the entire operations system with the business strategy. — location: 177 ^ref-43293

Competing on Quality — location: 235 ^ref-17651

Seems to be what I'm most interested in.

smooth flow of patients, supplies, and information along the care continuum. — location: 245 ^ref-47502

To gain the political support of the working class, governments in other developed countries had enacted some sort of social insurance program protecting individuals against the loss of wages during sickness. — location: 394 ^ref-37028

Progressive reformers in the United States also called for similar protection, but their efforts were thwarted by influential interest groups (physicians, labor, insurance companies, and businesses), fragmented support for social legislation, and the entry of the United States into World War I — location: 395 ^ref-35461

national health insurance program, which was initially proposed for inclusion in the Social Security Act of 1935, was never seriously discussed for fear that it would threaten the passage of the entire legislation. — location: 414 ^ref-45942

culprit. The conglomeration of vast hospital systems, pharmaceutical companies, insurers, and government programs was uncoordinated. — location: 456 ^ref-21920

neither President Nixon’s nor Senator Ted Kennedy’s plans for national health insurance mustered enough political support to get passed. — location: 458 ^ref-31305

President Bill Clinton proposed to reform the U.S. healthcare system with universal healthcare funded through expanded competition among private insurers in a regulated market. — location: 478 ^ref-44511

growth of healthcare costs accelerated during the 2000s, with an increase from 13% of gross domestic product (GDP) in 2000 to 17.9% in 2010. — location: 489 ^ref-24453

Affordable Care Act—into law on March 23, 2010. It was the largest expansion of healthcare regulation and coverage since the implementation of Medicare and Medicaid in 1965. The law required all citizens to be covered by health insurance (private or government programs), obligated insurance companies to cover all applicants (regardless of preexisting conditions), and provided assistance for the purchase of health insurance through tax subsidies for eligible — location: 493 ^ref-54281

participants. — location: 496 ^ref-9541

by early 2015, the rate of uninsured U.S. adults had dropped to a historic low of 12.9%, and 16.9 million people had gained coverage — location: 499 ^ref-9929

it is largely incumbent on the individual communities to persuade state and local policymakers to provide some regulatory flexibility allowing creative solutions to be implemented. — location: 523 ^ref-46819

Several healthcare economists have claimed that the use of new medical technologies and increased use of older ones contribute between 40% to 50% of the increase in healthcare costs. — location: 546 ^ref-10300

incompatibility of these systems — location: 557 ^ref-44227

deaths before the age of 50 years account for approximately two thirds of the difference in life expectancy between males in the United States and males in 16 other developed countries, — location: 562 ^ref-26568

Car accidents, gun violence, and drug overdoses were major contributors to years of life lost by Americans younger than age 50 years. — location: 565 ^ref-40648

since. In 2012, drug prices rose at twice the inflation rate, both as a result of high research and development costs and advertising expenses. — location: 581 ^ref-42635

about 20% of the total health expenditures originate from various inefficiencies such as unnecessary treatments, poor care coordination, administrative complexity (Box 1.7), and fraud and abuse. — location: 586 ^ref-24970

plurality of payment mechanisms — location: 608 ^ref-49229

multiple standards for coding, prescribing medicine, credentialing, quality metrics, and so on. — location: 612 ^ref-48749

In 2011, fraud and abuse resulted in Medicare and Medicaid payments in excess of $98 billion — location: 620 ^ref-61214

there remain deficiencies in the areas of primary and mental care. — location: 642 ^ref-45121

As for mental health, more than one third of adults and 40% of children did not receive the care they needed. — location: 644 ^ref-49513

lack of mental health services has even resulted in prisons sometimes being used as the largest mental health providers in their states — location: 645 ^ref-39875

Institute for Healthcare Improvement (IHI) launched The 100,000 Lives Campaign in 2005 — location: 669 ^ref-58322

There have been several initiatives to improve care coordination. Most rest on the strengthening of primary care, whereby a physician, physician assistant, or nurse practitioner provides ongoing care to patients and coordinates their care according to a preestablished service plan — location: 682 ^ref-3341

Whether nurse practitioners will be willing to treat more Medicaid patients at the low rate cannot be taken for granted — location: 751 ^ref-21399

Providers must reevaluate their ways of delivering care and strive for both effectiveness (doing it right the first time) and efficiency (doing it with minimum waste of time and resources). — location: 773 ^ref-41977

Currently, the best hopes for improvement lie with providers because they are the best positioned to critically analyze their operations and steer them on the path to excellence. — location: 776 ^ref-39915

Operations management (OM) is the practice of designing, running, and controlling the most effective and efficient systems for the production of products or provision of services. — location: 789 ^ref-39955

5S system (sort, simplify, sweep, standardize, and self-discipline) — location: 848 ^ref-65382

a vice president of operations is concerned with scanning the environment, developing an operations strategy (the long-term direction of the operations function), and monitoring the operations function’s performance in achieving its strategic goals. — location: 858 ^ref-2772

At the lower levels, OM professionals make decisions directly related to the production of goods or the provision of services — location: 860 ^ref-14633

Project management — location: 884 ^ref-37179

Quality management and statistical process control — location: 886 ^ref-50865

Designing flexible systems — location: 898 ^ref-8805

spiraling costs, disappointing overall quality performance, limited access, a complex regulatory environment, unfavorable population demographics, and shortages of PCPs and nurses. — location: 902 ^ref-9913

An operations strategy is based on four competitive priorities: quality, cost, fast or on-time delivery, and flexibility. — location: 905 ^ref-5964

quality, cost, fast or on-time delivery, and flexibility. — location: 905 ^ref-34284

OM professionals can be instrumental in improving healthcare. Their expertise enables them to design processes for better, faster, and more cost-effective care delivery. — location: 956 ^ref-35960

Basically, no one knows how much competition is appropriate in the healthcare sector and to what extent it is a threat or opportunity — location: 1320 ^ref-43462

Providers, therefore, face the dilemma of balancing the dual pressures of (a) patients and vendors urging them to be on the cutting edge and (b) payers forcing them to remain conservative by placing limits on reimbursements. — location: 1333 ^ref-20519

All strategic choices determine the position of the business unit relative to its competitors. — location: 1347 ^ref-22219

on the goal of the organization and the actions it takes to produce value greater than that offered by the competition. — location: 1350 ^ref-45561

the internal capabilities (structure, processes, and resources) management intends to use to achieve a particular strategy. — location: 1351 ^ref-8008

A lack of fit between the WHAT and the HOW will hinder the implementation of the business strategy and will potentially cripple performance, resulting in organizational failure — location: 1450 ^ref-17488

design of the processes needed to create services — location: 1456 ^ref-19577

quality improvement and assurance — location: 1456 ^ref-47908

Marketing provides Operations with an assessment of customers’ perceptions, unmet needs in the market, and demand forecasts for various services. — location: 1479 ^ref-40624

Use of healthcare data to improve quality, efficiency, and outcomes — location: 1498 ^ref-28931

experiential) — location: 1550 ^ref-22072

Front-line caregivers are encouraged to detect problems and raise their concerns freely. — location: 1586 ^ref-36658

Patient safety and effective care — location: 1607 ^ref-46732

Possible behavioral factors involved?

process redesign or reengineering might be the key to ensuring a care delivery process that minimizes medical errors and optimizes clinical outcomes. — location: 1609 ^ref-19559

quality as a means to decrease the costs associated with poor performance, such as rework, retesting, scrapped supplies, litigation, lower reimbursements from Medicare, and so on. — location: 1618 ^ref-47507

Ultimately, superior value wins orders and leads to greater competitiveness. — location: 1619 ^ref-64562

Nurse-on-Call program, patients call and describe their symptoms to a nurse who will direct them to the emergency department (ED), refer them to an urgent care facility, or simply schedule an appointment with a physician. This early triage reduces the incidence of costly ED visits. — location: 1633 ^ref-42197

Its reputation for high quality combined with attractive pricing has contributed to its designation as one of the six centers of excellence where Wal-Mart employees can undergo some procedures away from home, with no co-pays or deductibles (American Medical News, 2012). — location: 1650 ^ref-12660

The hospital's stellar reputation resulted in it having more "customers" due to more willingness of payers to send patients there for care.

delivery reliability may not necessarily improve a provider’s competitive advantage, but it can certainly make its business uncompetitive when it is lacking! — location: 1677 ^ref-833

the ability to change processes (process flexibility) — location: 1709 ^ref-39448

The business units investing in such flexible facilities organize their resources around the patient rather than processes. — location: 1715 ^ref-4899

an interesting distinction. When may it be better to focus on the process over the patient?

dissemination of information, — location: 1734 ^ref-32105

first devote their efforts to achieving excellence in quality, then to delivery, cost, and flexibility. — location: 1741 ^ref-18796

there was a consensus that quality was the building block of outstanding performance in all dimensions. — location: 1742 ^ref-6616

never underestimate the significance of order qualifiers. — location: 1758 ^ref-24807

HR promotes a culture of innovation and improvement through employee selection, training, and development. — location: 1773 ^ref-27490

Operations relies on Marketing’s and HR’s contributions to design, manage, and control the processes that enable the creation of value and lead to financial performance — location: 1773 ^ref-35858

a project denotes a set of team activities designed to produce a one-of-a-kind product or service. — location: 2042 ^ref-32458

two of the most important skills that a project manager must develop in big organizations are effective communication and conflict resolution.” — location: 2105 ^ref-45036

project managers should not carry out project tasks because they must keep their eyes on the bigger picture. — location: 2174 ^ref-29325

Being a project team member is a major responsibility. You must commit to the project goals and communicate honestly, particularly if you have concerns. You must also understand your work assignments and complete them on time to the best of your ability. — location: 2189 ^ref-50144

When defining the goals of a project, be sure to take the business strategy into account. First, ask where the organization wants to be in 1 year and 5 years. Then, identify the barriers keeping the organization from getting to where it wants to be. Will the project get the organization closer to that point? — location: 2241 ^ref-64195

The assumptions being made should be documented at the beginning of the project and revalidated at intervals. These assumptions include the external conditions that can affect the project, changing requirements, use of technology, and even government regulations. Planning also involves operational issues such as establishing budgets, setting timelines with major milestones, making decisions regarding personnel involvement and resource allocations, and setting performance expectations. — location: 2254 ^ref-61868

Projects must come to an end. This is the time to reflect and learn from what happened during the project. “What did we do right? What could have been done better? Did we achieve the desired quality result? Did we achieve our goal within the time frame and with the resources allocated?” — location: 2280 ^ref-28302

Incorporating a process of intentional and disciplined project review will impact the success of later projects as project managers and team members will want to improve their performance in the future. — location: 2282 ^ref-14388

delays and cost overruns occurred because plans were not finalized before construction began. — location: 2289 ^ref-20581

AON’s simplicity makes it intuitively appealing. Moreover, it is the convention of choice in some of the popular project management software packages such as Microsoft Project. — location: 2391 ^ref-32997

It is discouraging for team members to be asked to do things that are impossible to do. — location: 2836 ^ref-32425

Absence of trust — location: 2855 ^ref-44590

We respond to conflicts based on our perceptions of the situation, not necessarily to an objective review of the facts. — location: 2881 ^ref-47442

good project management is difficult, it is one of the most important skills one can develop in healthcare operations. — location: 2886 ^ref-34283

Leaders of the future will be those who can harness the skills of groups and solve tough problems. — location: 2889 ^ref-28744

Kerzner, H. R. — location: 3127 ^ref-18343

patient centered, — location: 3185 ^ref-3473

As healthcare managers, our challenge is to develop and improve the processes that will exceed those expectations. — location: 3309 ^ref-8892

Indicators are operationalized definitions of quality; they can be observed, measured, and tracked consistently by the service provider. — location: 3344 ^ref-58971

It is a good idea to generate a large number of indicators because some of them might be discarded later if deemed less adequate than others in capturing the VOC. — location: 3346 ^ref-13521

Process flexibility is the ease with which a process can be modified to improve competitiveness. — location: 11576 ^ref-289