Applying Lean healthcare in a non-profit hospital in Brazil

Brazil is South America's largest country both in geographic size and population. Consequently, its Unified Health System faces significant challenges due to the country's size and widespread regional and social inequalities. In addition, it often encounters poor management of resources and insufficient funding. Lean concepts have been successfully implemented in healthcare as a tool for process improvement in developed countries. In contrast, this study focuses on the application of Lean Healthcare in an emerging country. A case study of a Brazilian non-profit hospital suggests that Lean techniques application may result in both significant process improvements and cost savings for non-profit hospitals of public healthcare systems in emerging countries. At the same time, the lessons learned from this case study, in terms of process improvement through the adoption of Lean Healthcare, show that a variety of healthcare systems around the world could benefit from it.