madtexan

Dear Chris,
I would have replied to Nancy Tario by email if I had here address. Email addresses are not posted on the iSixSigma Forum, though. Did you happen to know her email address?

Good day Sue. American Society of Quality has several books for Healthcare Providers that focus on Lean techniques and ideas. I have not read any yet but have found all the books that I have purchased from ASQ to be practical and easy to read while being thorough. Just go to asq.org, go to the store and type in Lean healthcare. Several books…[Read more]

Angie, I write newsletters relating healthcare to lean six sigma. I have many old newsletters that may be of help. Also, you can go to the American Society of Quality website to find out more about LSS and TQM. There is lots of free data there.

For a 30 minute LSS exercise have them do something that they can all relate to. So, the ER mapping process is probably pretty good. Divide them into teams and have each team in 15 minutes or so diagram the process as they understand it. In the next 15 minutes put up a process which is a agreed upon composite of each team. Then you start out…[Read more]

Paul,
If you want to chat further about strategies, I would be glad to discuss solving the problem with a team approach, which is probably the best way. You can contact me through my website–http://www.bryantsstatisticalconsulting.com–if you like.

Do you use PI teams at your site? If so, then providing examples of why data accuracy is important in such a setting would be good. Also, you could get feedback from the team on any difficulties encountered would be helpful. Solving the problem in a teams effort, as a kaizen, would probably be the best approach.

Craig, I believe that few have brought LSS to the primary care site. I am currently working with a group to bring the Chronic Care Model to area PCPs with a Lean implementation. This work is part of a Robert Woods Johnson Foundation grant. We are at the stage of developing a center that will aid and advise physicians. Here in Michigan we are…[Read more]

If you type housekeeping quality into the search function of the healthcare site of iSixSigma, you will find several articles. Try this link for an article specifically about Lean 5S and housekeeping: http://healthcare.isixsigma.com/library/content/c061120a.asp. If I can be of further help, please contact me through my web site…[Read more]

I agree with BritW about using Quality Function Deployment. You might want to check out the article Guidelines for Six Sigma Healthcare Project Selection which you can find on this web site. It is useful even for beginners. If you have any further questions, you can contact me through my web site:

You might try the article “Healthcare Organizations: What to Do When
the Low-Hanging Fruit is Gone.” It has some good tools and ideas. It
is found on this website.

Dear Lori,
I searched the iSixSigma web site for a problem such as yours and
found this article: http://healthcare.isixsigma.com/library/content/
c040107a.asp. It is a quick read. As far as getting physician
support, show them how they can Win by adopting schedules that
work better for Labs.Any other questions, contact me at…[Read more]

I believe that the numerator in the mortality rate would only count
those who died while in the ICU, not those who died after
discharge. I gather this not from direct knowledge of IHI’s intent,
but on the principal that the mortality rate would be derived from
deaths attributable to ICU care. It would make no sense to count a
death of…[Read more]

If you have sample sizes of 30 or greater then you can assume that
the mean of your sample is normally distributed. Unless you know
the population standard deviation, which is rare, then you should use
the t-test for your mean. Also, in regression, a sample size of 30
validates the t-test for the regression parameters. For sample sizes…[Read more]

Natalie, I believe that vendor selection has some good
opportunities for your training. You might explore how well you
work as a team in vendor selection, if indeed you use team imput
in this area. You will get a lot of teamwork in your training, I hope.
Also, you might want to examine several times in the past in which
you have…[Read more]

I see that there are many requests for VSM. VSM seems to be the
rage right now in quality improvement. But let’s remember that
there are many tools out there for quality improvement. For
instance, VSM does not lend itself to designing new products or
processes as well as some other tools, like Failure Mode and Effects
Analysis. I…[Read more]

Dear Mark, Does this mean you are mean you are going to have the project
follow the patient from admission to discharge? It sure sounds like
it. I think that if this is so, you are biting off a huge chunk. I’ve
heard of many six sigma projects just focusing on one segment of
throughput, like time spent at admission. I would try to…[Read more]

QFD is basically a means of getting the requirements of the
customer into the design of a product or service. It can be quite
technical, as when developing an automobile, or simpler, when
getting the voice of the customer into the design of a service.
Hence, the important thing is to get the “voice of the customer”
and then design a…[Read more]

Mr. Cole,
Sounds to me as if you have many special causes of
nonconformance, instead of random disruptions. According to
common ideas about capability indices, your process should be in
control before measuring Cp or such; with random deviations you
are much more likely to have normal distributions. You can refer
to Breyfogle’s…[Read more]

You’re welcome, Clare. If you have any other questions, you can
find contact info for me at http://www.bryantsstatisticalconsulting.comHave a good day

Although I have not read it, you might try to look at a copy of
“How to Use Patient Satisfaction Data to Improve Healthcare
Quality” by Ralph Bell and Michael Krivich. You can find out more
about it at American Society for Quality bookstore. You can find it
at http://qualitypress.asq.orgGood luckDonald Bryant