IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/gam/jsusta/v13y2021i19p10911-d647612.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Applying Lean Healthcare to Improve the Discharge Process in a Mexican Academic Medical Center

Author

Listed:
  • Rodrigo E. Peimbert-García

    (School of Engineering, Macquarie University, Sydney, NSW 2109, Australia
    School of Engineering and Sciences, Tecnologico de Monterrey, Monterrey 64849, NL, Mexico)

  • Luis Meave Gutiérrez-Mendoza

    (Department of Public Health, Faculty of Medicine, Universidad Autónoma de San Luis Potosí, San Luis Potosí 78300, SLP, Mexico)

  • Heriberto García-Reyes

    (School of Engineering and Sciences, Tecnologico de Monterrey, Monterrey 64849, NL, Mexico)

Abstract

Lean Thinking has been one of the preferred approaches to improve healthcare processes in developed countries; however, it has been barely used in Latin America. This study presents a Lean implementation in a Mexican public academic medical center. The goal was to reduce the time required to discharge patients from the Internal Medicine Department. This non-experimental intervention study measured, analyzed, and improved the process flow through a time study, value-added/non-value-added analysis, and the four-step quick changeover approach. Once changes were implemented, inferential statistics were used to compare results. Lean implementation allowed reducing the time to discharge patients from 6 to 3 h by eliminating 57% of non-value-added activities and 70% of errors found in discharge orders. This represents a 2% annual capacity increase and a 6.423 h bed made available without investment. Other findings include barriers regarding untrained staff about process improvement and departmental barriers and a successful quick changeover implementation. This is one of the handful of implementations of Lean Healthcare in Latin America. Furthermore, this is one of the very first studies that showcase the implementation of the quick changeover approach in healthcare. Further research should focus on the long-term impact and how the specific environment encourages/discourages future implementations.

Suggested Citation

  • Rodrigo E. Peimbert-García & Luis Meave Gutiérrez-Mendoza & Heriberto García-Reyes, 2021. "Applying Lean Healthcare to Improve the Discharge Process in a Mexican Academic Medical Center," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(19), pages 1-11, September.
    • Handle: RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:13:y:2021:i:19:p:10911-:d:647612
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/13/19/10911/pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/13/19/10911/
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Luana Bonome Message Costa & Moacir Godinho Filho & Antonio Freitas Rentes & Thiago Moreno Bertani & Ronaldo Mardegan, 2017. "Lean healthcare in developing countries: evidence from Brazilian hospitals," International Journal of Health Planning and Management, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 32(1), pages 99-120, January.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Åhlin, Philip & Almström, Peter & Wänström, Carl, 2022. "When patients get stuck: A systematic literature review on throughput barriers in hospital-wide patient processes," Health Policy, Elsevier, vol. 126(2), pages 87-98.
    2. Tasdemir, Cagatay & Hiziroglu, Salim, 2019. "Achieving cost efficiency through increased inventory leanness: Evidences from oriented strand board (OSB) industry," International Journal of Production Economics, Elsevier, vol. 208(C), pages 412-433.
    3. Juan A. Marin-Garcia & Pilar I. Vidal-Carreras & Julio J. Garcia-Sabater, 2021. "The Role of Value Stream Mapping in Healthcare Services: A Scoping Review," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 18(3), pages 1-25, January.
    4. Cagatay Tasdemir & Rado Gazo, 2018. "A Systematic Literature Review for Better Understanding of Lean Driven Sustainability," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 10(7), pages 1-54, July.
    5. Najla Alemsan & Guilherme Luz Tortorella & Alejandro Francisco Mac Cawley Vergara & Carlos Manuel Taboada Rodriguez & Alberto Portioli Staudacher, 2022. "Implementing a material planning and control method for special nutrition in a Brazilian public hospital," International Journal of Health Planning and Management, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 37(1), pages 202-213, January.
    6. Letícia Bianchini de Barros & Letícia de Camargo Bassi & Laura Passos Caldas & Alice Sarantopoulos & Eliete Boaventura Bargas Zeferino & Vinicius Minatogawa & Renata Cristina Gasparino, 2021. "Lean Healthcare Tools for Processes Evaluation: An Integrative Review," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 18(14), pages 1-21, July.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:13:y:2021:i:19:p:10911-:d:647612. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: MDPI Indexing Manager (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.mdpi.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.