Quality in Trauma Care: Improving the Discharge Procedure of Patients by Means of Lean Six Sigma

Abstract

Our study shows that Lean Six Sigma is an effective method to reduce inappropriate hospital stay, thereby improving the quality and financial efficiency of trauma care.

Factors Affecting Revenue From the Management of Pelvis and Acetabulum Fractures

“…Altogether these practices should decrease the time from injury to surgery and should minimize hospital LOS. [42][43][44] Patients with pelvis and acetabulum fractures and complications over their course of care had longer ICU and regular hospital stays, accounting for additional $14,829 in mean costs per patient. Other studies have also demonstrated greater treatment costs along with better margins in trauma patients who had complications.…”

Lean methodology for performance improvement in the trauma discharge process

“…1 It is this improvement in efficiency and throughput that is the goal of LOS reduction. 7 This efficiency is necessary in modern health care because of the increasing demand for trauma beds, seen with increased trauma admissions and a concurrent decrease in number of beds available for trauma patients. This efficiency must be gained without a loss in quality.…”

Detecting performance variance in complex surgical procedures: analysis of a step-wise technique for laparoscopic right hepatectomy

“…6 The manufacturing quality tools such as Lean management (LM) and Six Sigma (SS) are being implemented more frequently at hospitals around the world in an effort to raise patient and personnel satisfaction as well as improving healthcare quality on different settings, increasing efficiency and saving unnecessary costs. [7][8][9][10][11] In a systematic review of the literature, 177 articles on productivity tools used in health care have been published during the last decade. 12,13 These reports have shown that the implementation of process improvement tools positively impact OR efficiency without impairing the quality of patient care.…”