Performance Analysis of Emergency Room Episodes Through Process Mining

Abstract

The performance analysis of Emergency Room episodes is aimed at providing decision makers with knowledge that allows them to decrease waiting times, reduce patient congestion, and improve the quality of care provided. In this case study, Process Mining is used to determine which activities, sub-processes, interactions, and characteristics of episodes explain why some episodes have a longer duration. The employed method and the results obtained are described in detail to serve as a guide for future performance analysis in this domain. It was discovered that the main cause of the increment in the episode duration is the occurrence of a loop between the Examination and Treatment sub-processes. It was also found out that as the episode severity increases, the number of repetitions of the Examination–Treatment loop increases as well. Moreover, the episodes in which this loop is more common are those that lead to Hospitalization as discharge destination. These findings might help to reduce the occurrence of this loop, in turn lowering the episode duration and, consequently, providing faster attention to more patients.

Recommendations for enhancing the usability and understandability of process mining in healthcare

“…They can, for instance, mine social networks to understand interaction patterns between healthcare professionals during the process [55], to identify parts/characteristics of the process contributing to an increased duration of the process [56] and to study the impact on the process of changes such as a move to new facilities [57].…”

Process Mining-Supported Emergency Room Process Performance Indicators

“…In [ 9 ], the authors proposed a comprehensive question-driven methodology, which provides a data reference model, frequently-posed questions, and the detailed stages to solve the questions using process mining. [ 13 ] proposed the six-phase method for performance analysis of emergency room episodes: extraction and transformation, activity aggregation, filtering, discovery, analysis, and results and evaluation. [ 10 ] presented a methodology, including six phases: identification of performance indicators, data collection and preparation, process discovery, process monitoring, process analysis, and performance comparison.…”

“…[ 14 ] suggested a methodology to verify compliance with clinical guidelines for actual clinical practice using process mining. As far as the second research direction is concerned, [ 15 ] suggested a couple of time-related metrics using process mining tools. In addition, [ 16 ] proposed time-related indicators that focus on the elapsed time between two ER activities, such as triage and doctor seen.…”

A Review of Various Methods of Management of Risk in the Field of Emergency Medicine

“…For achieving the most appropriate standardise recommendation in the management of care with the lower rate of occurrence of risks and damages, most of the healthcare providers should be capable of monitoring the quality of conducted services through a documented mechanism like a prepared checklist. On the other hand, the associated organisations that provide accreditation services in the medical departments must impose legal documents to the medical centres that could engage them in providing high-quality care [46].…”