The other day, I stumbled across an old article that I remember, as it was published in the Wall Street Journal in 2004. The WSJ normally has a paywall, but this article is old enough that it’s free to the…
TL;DR: Dr. Gary Kaplan describes Virginia Mason’s adoption of Lean as a “war on waste,” but the real impact goes beyond waste reduction. By applying the Toyota Production System as a management system–not just a set of tools–Virginia Mason improved…
tl;dr: Human error is inevitable–even for experienced professionals. Forgetting socks on a work trip is harmless, but similar mistakes in healthcare or organizations can cause real harm. The lesson isn’t to “be more careful,” but to design better systems that…
It's great to see Lean healthcare featured in one of the world's leading news and business publications. The Economist recently published this article:
"Hospitals are learning from industry how to cut medical errors"
Tomorrow, my post will be about headlines that scream about ratings for The Oscars being "down from last year" or "the lowest in X years." As I've blogged about before, I'm always skeptical of such simplistic comparisons that might mask the real underlying trend.
But first, could the Academy avoid last year's embarrassing mixup?
it's great to see an 11 year old thinking like an engineer and an entrepreneur. He's the son of a Toyota "operational excellence" consultant. For those who try to unfortunately equate Lean to a "clean desk policy," the father's desk is a great argument against banning family photos and an illustration of why Lean isn't about putting tape around everything...
One thing I like about Facebook is the way it reminds you about things that happened on this date in previous years. Facebook is reminding me these days about different milestones related to the publication of the book Healthcare Kaizen that…
Can physician-led surgical centers provide lower out-of-pocket prices for patients, along with lower infection rates, and higher compensation for the surgeons? One surgical center in Oklahoma says so...
Art Byrne's latest book, The Lean Turnaround Action Guide, has a lot of great tips that he's trying to share, CEO to CEO. How many CEOs are reading this book and heeding his advice, in manufacturing or in healthcare?
Here are some recorded keynote talks and video presentations from the "Results Washington" annual conference, as part of the state's Lean government efforts. See this post for talks from LEI's Jim Womack and John Shook, Toyota's Jamie Bonini, and many healthcare improvement leaders.
You might remember the hubbub (a kerfuffle?) over the NEJM opinion piece written by Dr. Jerome Groopman and Dr. Pamela Hartzband. See my first post about their article. There are more links at the bottom of this post Now, the “Perspective”…
I want to preface this post by saying it’s mostly about questions, not answers. I’ve had many readers and acquaintances ask me about what’s been going on at Virginia Mason Medical Center in Seattle. The short answer is: “I don’t…
