Creating highly reliable health care organisations through reverse exchanges

Abstract

Purpose This paper aims to explore patient to care provider reverse exchanges to improve the care processes and service supply chain using an online feedback platform. This paper demonstrates how a better understanding of timely and unsolicited feedback (“voice of the patient as a customer”) stimulates local interventions to improve service delivery and enact the essential characteristics of highly reliable organisations (HRO). Design/methodology/approach A realist approach involving an exploratory hospital case study using user feedback from an IT patient feedback platform. The methodology included interviews, secondary data and access to thousands of patient feedback narratives. Findings The findings show that a systems approach to the supply chain, using real-time feedback to enact process improvement is beneficial and a fruitful source of innovation for professional services staff. The setting of the improvement focusses on a true “voice of the customer” rather than attempting to improve arbitrarily internal process efficiency has major benefits for staff and their engagement with the right interventions to support higher performance. Practical implications The findings show major positive benefits for the adaptation and constant reflection of staff on the service provided to patients. The approach provides a means of reflecting as to whether the current supply chain and service provision are fit for purpose, as well as reliable, efficient and of value to the consumer. Originality/value This study is one of a few that adopt the consumer orientation needed to fully exploit the concepts of patient-centric improvement by including dynamic feedback in the supply chain and systems approach to care.

Quality functions' use of customer feedback as activation triggers for absorptive capacity and value co-creation

“…A mentioned challenge, however, is the lack of control over which information is relayed during crossfunctional meetings, in which feedback that does not directly relate to product quality tends to not reach the quality function (e.g. Kumar et al, 2020). There is a risk to rely on individual relations through which customer feedback reaches the quality function.…”

“…Codified feedback is data acquired and transmitted digitally, as in a formal database, whereas personalised feedback is generated and transmitted between people. Beyond types of data, another dimension concerns whether providers actively solicit feedback, referred to as active feedback , or initiated by customers, referred to as passive feedback (Kumar et al. , 2020).…”

“…However, recent studies show that the quality function does not fully exploit customer feedback (Elg et al. , 2020; Kumar et al. , 2020).…”

“…Offering both products and services increases pressure on the quality function to thoroughly understand the subjective value created for customers during product usage (Wen et al, 2020). However, recent studies show that the quality function does not fully exploit customer feedback (Elg et al, 2020;Kumar et al, 2020). As interest in services increases, the use of customer feedback, ranging from personalised to codified, increasingly challenges quality function to identify customers' feedback earlier and use it to focus on value creation (Birch-Jensen et al, 2020;Gunasekaran et al, 2019;Sj€ odin et al, 2019).…”

Interpreting the meaning of High Reliability Organisations in a healthcare context: A study of NHS Wales

“…However, when healthcare processes go wrong, the damage created affects the primary individual involved as well as staff and other stakeholders (carers and family etc.) and failure is measured in terms of safety and quality of care failures (Kumar et al, 2020;Burgess et al, 2016).…”