Problem
UCHealth’s hospitals and clinics have been trusted health care destinations for generations of Coloradans. Today, based on four consecutive years of recognition of its superior nursing processes and quality patient care from the American Nurses Credentialing Center and its ranking as one of the top 15 hospitals in the country by US News and World Report, UCHealth hospitals are uniquely positioned to meet the health care needs of families throughout the Rocky Mountain region and the entire United States.
Previous rapid improvement events focused on first-case-on-time starts and turnover times had not significantly improved utilization in a substantive, sustainable manner. Leadership knew their volume was likely to continue to increase before new ORs could be built. Feeling a sense of urgency and pressure to increase OR utilization with a scalable approach, UCHealth turned to LeanTaaS, a partner with whom they had worked with to improve operations in its 10 infusion centers.
Solution
UCHealth partnered with LeanTaaS to deploy iQueue for Operating Rooms’ Exchange and Analyze modules throughout 25 inpatient and 8 outpatient ORs at their metro Denver location at University of Colorado Hospital. After seeing the impact those two modules had on improving their utilization, UCHealth extended its use of the solution to its other community hospitals and ambulatory surgery centers. iQueue for Operating Rooms’ modular approach allows healthcare providers the flexibility to deploy modules individually or in any combination.
With access to data-driven performance metrics and the ability to release and/or request block time without an endless series of phone calls, emails, and faxes, UCHealth surgeons have enthusiastically embraced iQueue for Operating Rooms.
Results
The following results were calculated by comparing the six month period post-iQueue launch to the analogous six months in the previous calendar year.
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