In my years of being complicated in potential revision in manufacturing, service industries and healthcare I have encountered many separate potential programs: Total potential Management, Six Sigma, plan-do-check-act, lean production, Baldrige, and Lean Six Sigma, the current favorite it seems. In the first few years of the 2000s Six Sigma was becoming the "flavor of the month." Forrest Breyfogle had published his influential work on Six Sigma in 1999.
Which program is the best in the healthcare setting? Are there absolutely any indispensable differences among them? Let me address the latter inquire with an illustration comparing Total potential administration and Six Sigma.
Health Care Management Programs
Six Sigma and Total potential administration (Tqm) in the healthcare field are quite separate in their coming to potential although they are complimentary. Six Sigma focuses on reducing the variability in a accepted process whereas Tqm focuses on a mindset. For instance, suppose you want to apply Six Sigma techniques to the amount of time it takes to prep a surgical operation room to get it ready for the next surgery. That is, you want to standardize the prepping of a surgical operation room so that the amount of time taken to do so is consistent from one prep time to the next. Using Six Sigma, you would write down in information the process that all supervene in prepping the surgical operation room. The details of the process should come from a representative team of staff who are very customary with the process as it exists. If the process in not standardized, then the team should form what it believes would be the best process. After the standardized process is delineated, the Six Sigma task leader will take a sample of times it takes to ready the surgical operation room from a random sample of actual occurrences of prepping over several days or weeks and part the variance (a statistical measure) of the prepping. The leader will plot the variances and check to see if they meet the mathematical standards prescribed in the Six Sigma process. This coming is repeated until the variability of the prep time meets required standards and is maintained in hereafter applications of the prepping.
Tqm is not as mathematically focused. It concentrates on the attitudes towards potential of all staff and managers at a healthcare site. Taking the prep time example above, all the personnel complicated in the prepping would hopefully have a similar attitude about the potential of the prepping process. Rather than just participating in an revision process as is done in Six Sigma because of the demands of a manager, they will be willing supporters of the revision process and will be knowledgeable of the outcomes of being committed to the process-namely that there will less opening for errors that will have adverse effects on patients and that results will be inevitable for all. The hospital will be respected by the doctors who are using the facilities as they won't have to feel long or irregular waits for using the surgical operation theater. The staff prepping the room will have more pride in the work since they are an active part in developing the standardized work. Too, they become active participants in the potential program as they continually look for ways to enhance upon the prepping process. The patients, the greatest customers, will advantage as there will be less opening for acquiring infections in the surgical operation process and less opening of other errors. Of course the administration and leaders of the hospital, who are finally responsible for the Tqm program, are satisfied as they enhance the outcomes for their customers, the patients, while enhancing the bottom line.
As you can probably see, each has its strengths and weaknesses. Six Sigma focuses on one process at a time and Tqm focuses on the widespread photograph without much mathematical analysis. If you were to adopt a Six Sigma approach, you might reach the 3.4 errors per million opportunities, the greatest goal of Six Sigma, for a particular process; however, there will be many other processes that need revision that are neglected because Six Sigma does not look at the whole photograph at a site. an additional one process may even be negatively impacted by the improved Six Sigma process. I know that in manufacturing cost savings in one process realized straight through Six Sigma have increased waste and cost in an additional one process sometimes.
With Tqm employees and managers will continuously seek ways to enhance all processes at a site, if the methodology is correctly deployed. However, there will be limitations as to revision of any given process if mathematical approaches such as employed in Six Sigma are not used. Discrepancy will not be tamped down as much as it could be and there will still be opportunities for eliminating errors that could be missed.
To me it seems that no one coming is best. A blend of techniques from several methods can be used. For a healthcare supplier with its own potential department, it would be inherent to have staff employed who individually are competent in separate potential fields and be able together to use the best coming for any potential revision project. For instance, such an society might want to have its staff certified in separate areas by the American community of potential or have individuals with manifold certifications, which is quite common. In my understanding three desirable certifications would be certified potential manager, certified potential engineer (which I am) and certified six sigma black belt or green belt. You could also seek certification from other organizations in Lean Six Sigma Black Belt. It is not enough just to have the members of the potential group certified, though. Leaders of the society should have indispensable training in potential Management.
What should a healthcare site with a small staff do? For instance, what coming should a original care site take? If the original care site is part of a physicians society or physician/hospital association, it should be able to rely on that society to furnish expertise, either straight through a staff man with indispensable potential training and certification or straight through the use of a consultant. I would also recommend that the office employer at each original care site have training in potential administration and that at least one doctor have potential training too. I know of several instances at original care sites where the drive to enhance potential or form a patient-centered healing home was driven by a physician. Training and certification of other staff would be very helpful.
For a healthcare site not part of a larger umbrella society and with a small staff it is important that the leader of the site have indispensable training in potential management. Hiring a consultant to work on a few projects while mentoring a few staff in the use of a few basic potential tools would enable the staff at the site to continuously enhance the processes at the site and reap the rewards for doing so-improved sick person outcomes, improved bottom line, and more time to get things done.
Overall, I believe that every healthcare society needs to have staff who are trained in the use of potential tools from several separate methodologies which are a good fit with its staff's abilities. Even better would be to have some staff become certified by a potential society such as American community of Quality. By doing this the society will be able to see that potential revision is a continuous and never-ending process which can help the society reach its strategic goals.
What Is Six Sigma in condition Care?
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