A medical center in Amsterdam, concerned over the failure to consistently dispatch medical reports in a timely manner, utilized a Lean Six Sigma (LSS) initiative to study the underlying problems and design a cure.
The upshot was a dramatic turnaround in the dispatch of patient reports from the Gastrointestinal Oncology Center Amsterdam (GIOCA) to primary care providers: From 12.3% being delivered on the day of the visit, to a much timelier 90.6%.
The effort and its results were outlined in a research report published online Feb. 8 in the Journal of Evaluation in Clinical Practice. The study was led by Yara L. Basta, M.D., of the Academic Medical Center in Amsterdam, and his colleagues.
The prompt dispatch of patient medical records is an important communications facet of quality healthcare. While GIOCA had an internal standard in place covering their dispatch, the hospital had experienced growth in patients, causing its administrative processes – and the standard – to be compromised.
In seeking to rectify the problem, a team was formed to study the causes and to apply the five phases of LSS – define, measure, analyze, improve and control – to guide changes in the logistic process.
Three main causes were found behind the delays:
- Challenges in determining which physicians involved in the treatment would compose the patient report.
- The requirement that a medical specialist review reports composed by senior residents.
- That a medical specialist was required to authorize the dispatch of the patient report by the center’s administration.
The cure was developed by creating a digital form in the electronic medical record, to be completed during the center’s multidisciplinary team meeting. By smoothing out the process logistics, the same-day dispatch rate between the hospital and primary care was substantially improved.
