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Master of Science, Healthcare Administration. Certified Healthcare Business Consultant. Certified Business Appraiser. Certified Valuation Analyst.

Tuesday, September 29, 2009

Lean and Six Sigma in the Medical Practice

Lean process improvement and Six Sigma are interesting concepts, especially in healthcare. I've written papers about both of these methods albeit in a very academic context as part of my Master's program. Lean and Six Sigma always struck me as techniques that would work best in large organizations with thousands of iterations in a process or series of processes; it's more difficult when you have a smaller sample set of data to work with. In addition, smaller organizations have less resources to track data, complete root-cause analysis, implement process improvements, and set a program like this into perpetual motion. Finding a way to bring these ideas into smaller organizations like medical practices is genius. Obviously, medical practices DO have thousands of iterations in processes...medical charts, script writing, billing, coding, etc. I'm thinking of picking up "Mastering Lean Six Sigma for the Medical Practice, by Frank Cohen and Owen Dahl." Will let you know how it is. Owen Dahl, by the way, is a fellow colleague in the NSCHBC and was my instructor for the CHBC certification course...very knowledgeable guy!

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