As the reception queues kept growing in this busy hospital the concept of eliminating them altogether seemed almost too good to be true. And yet today Birmingham Children's Hospital has achieved this – and much more besides.
The setting
This busy outpatient department with around 500 patients each day had a clear need for managing patient flows. Families sometimes had to queue for up to 30 minutes, just to register at reception. The patients would then wait to be called forward without any knowledge of how long they were expected to wait.
Service for families
"As this is a children's hospital we often have mums, dads, brothers and sisters coming in with the patients so there are always a lot of people in the reception area," said Peter Grogan, Outpatient Services Manager at Birmingham Children's Hospital. "We felt it was important to do something about the long queues and to give the patients and their families a chance to see how they are progressing through the system while they are waiting," he said.
In order to take managerial control of the outpatient department, the hospital decided to invest in Q-Matic's solution for Patient Flow Management.
The solution
A comprehensive workshop lead by Q-Matic's consultants was initiated, including planning and design of the department and patient flow processes. The overall objective of the workshop was to effectively align the Patient Flow Management with business and management processes. Initially, the consultants looked at the various activities, roles and responsibilities of the department, as well as performance measures and targets. The consultants, working closely with the outpatient management, then proceeded to develop the business processes to be applied to the flow management of outpatients. A solution was found, both for: 1. the medium term, and 2. the long term.
1. The medium term
Primarily, a patient flow system would eliminate queues while keeping patients informed and organised. As part of the process, the consultants defined the system's functionality and configuration with the aim to optimise the patient experience and staff effectiveness. The process was broken down into 4 phases: 1. meet & greet, 2. reception, 3. treatment rooms, and 4. consulting rooms. Each point was analysed, identifying issues and opportunities. A comprehensive patient flow system was installed, configured and tailored to meet each service point’s specific concern.
The system
The new Q-Matic system will connect the reception area with the nurses’ stations and the consulting rooms, 26 in total. The clinicians will be able to have a real time view of the people waiting and the doctors will be able to call their patients forward as they wish.
"The system should relieve some of the stress from the nurses, as everyone will able to see exactly where they are in the queue," Peter Grogan said. "Also, it saves time for the receptionists who don’t have to deal with any other patients than outpatients as people are filtered out upon entry if they are in the wrong place," he said.
2. The long term
Each day, week or month, managers will be able to see reports on number of patients seen, average waiting time at any one time or day, average delay times etc. The data generated by the system can be used for resource planning and budgeting. Managers can plan staffing needs based on real data, and avoid bottlenecks building up.
The live management information generated by the system also enables the managers to take immediate measures if necessary. Managers can see patient volumes at all times, real and calculated future waiting times for reception, treatment rooms and consulting rooms. In addition, managers can see, in real time, any appointment delay times as and when they happen. As soon as waiting times exceed the set limits, managers are alerted by the system and can act accordingly.
Going forward
As patients now take a ticket and sit down in a comfortable waiting area instead of queuing, there is less stress and anxiety in the reception area. Patients are called forward based on appointment time. In the next stage, they will automatically be transferred throughout the department. The management will have a complete overview of the department and the organisational efficiency will increase. Continuous training and follow up support from Q-Matic ensure the busy outpatient department maintains and improves performance and patient service daily.