The Sign on the Wall Was a Confession Two staff members are repositioning a patient by hand. The lift assist that’s supposed to be used for this — the equipment the hospital bought specifically so nobody does it this way…
There’s a hospital somewhere this quarter presenting a labor efficiency story to its board. A unit that used to have a dedicated charge nurse now has a “Working Charge Nurse” – someone who takes patients and runs the unit. The…
A nurse makes a medication error. A patient is harmed. The nurse already feels terrible — they went into healthcare to help people, and now the worst has happened. Then comes the organizational response. The investigation. The suspension. Maybe termination.…
This week is National Nurses Week. Nurses are highly skilled and, too often, are underappreciated.
Lean should be one of the best things that ever happened to nurses. In a truly Lean environment, we wouldn't be understaffed. Nurses wouldn't get blamed and punished for systemic problems. Hospitals and the broader healthcare system would break down silos and barriers to care. And, nurses would be treated respectfully by everybody in the system at all times.
Instead of being a hospital to celebrate and thank nurses, I'm on some vacation time through next Tuesday. So, I'll leave some of my favorite blog posts and podcasts about nursing and Lean here in this post.
Thanks as always to Ryan McCormack for this… there’s always so much good reading, listening, and viewing shared here by him! Subscribe to get these directly from Ryan via email. Insights about improvement, innovation, and leadership… Operational Excellence, Improvement, and…
Nursing turnover is very likely costing your organization millions of dollars. But you don’t have to just accept that… you can fix it. I’m happy to have moderated a webinar that was hosted by Value Capture, presented by two leaders…
I was prompted today to think about an excerpt from my book Lean Hospitals: Improving Quality, Patient Safety, and Employee Engagement: “In many hospital settings, staffing levels are set by benchmarking data, rules of thumb, habit, or financial constraints. Ideally,…
Thanks as always to Ryan McCormack for this… there’s always so much good reading, listening, and viewing shared here by him! News, blogs, articles, resources, and links about creating value, continuous improvement, innovation, and leadership. Healthcare – Creating Value for…
Thanks as always to Ryan McCormack for this… there’s always so much good reading, listening, and viewing shared here by him! News, blogs, articles, resources, and links about creating value, continuous improvement, innovation, and leadership. Healthcare – Creating Value for…
TL;DR: When staff invent workarounds to cope with shortages or failures, the real problem isn’t their behavior–it’s the system leaders allowed to fail. This blog post is a collaboration with a Lean healthcare consulting friend of mine, who heard another…
Here is a story that was sent to me by a blog reader, who needs to remain anonymous. I know the blog reader fairly well and believe what’s written here to be true. The blog reader is a career-long Lean…
My guest for Episode #343 of the podcast is Amanda Mewborn, an executive director of project management for Piedmont Health. I’ve known Amanda through the Society for Health Systems and she’s one of the very small number of people I…
