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Giving Bad Joints the Boot
Instead of patients staying in the hospital two or three days, about 64 percent were discharged within a day of surgery.
- The best place to recover from joint replacement surgery is at home.
- Nurses make post-discharge calls to patients and discuss at team huddles
When The Game Changes, Change Your Game
This team remained flexible and confident in its ability to adjust to change after health care reform transformed their patient population.
- Nearly 80 percent of the department’s patients who have high blood pressure are African American and at greater risk of severe consequences.
- Loaning patients testing kits they can take home helps control blood pressure levels.
Simple, Surprising Savings
Team saves thousands simply by reducing supply waste.
- Keeping costs down helps keep Kaiser Permanente affordable for members and patients.
- Mobilizing all UBT members to use stickers to indicate which supplies they use—and which they could live without
Right Team, Right Tool, Right Test
Reduced lab errors from ten percent to three percent within five months.
- The faster and more accurately patients get their lab results back, the more satisfied they are.
- Standardize workflow for processing lab specimens and orders
Go Green
Eco-projects are saving an estimated $12,000 a year at one medical center.
- Green projects protect the environment, save money and help workers build career skills.
- Enroll the entire EVS department in a green skills certification class
For the Love of Kids
Nearly 35 children took part in this farm-to-table initiative.
- The 2015 National Agreement calls for greater union engagement in community benefit programs.
- Involve childen in growing and cooking their own healthy food
Why Speaking Up Matters
Patients suffer fewer hospital-acquired infections and staff has high morale and low turnover.
- Speaking up leads to fewer patient infections and more satisfied staff.
- Physicians, nurses, dieticians, pharmacists, social workers and other caregivers take part in multidisciplinary daily patient rounding together
Giving Patients a Voice
Improvements suggested by a parent advisory council ease the stress of new moms and dads whose babies are in the NICU.
- Unit-based teams make innovations that have a big impact when they include patients in their improvement efforts.
- Members of this NICU host a bimonthly parent advisory council and include moms and dads members in the department’s tests of change
An Rx for Efficiency
Overtime use dropped by 75 percent, with an initial cost savings of $180,000.
- Patients need to get their medication quickly and easily. The Central Refill Pharmacy found a way to make that happen more efficiently.
- Expand the night shift to prevent big backlogs
Invent Our Future
Frontline innovation with new technology and service models are improving care and keeping KP a health care leader.
- Clinical quality, patient satisfaction and employee growth and development all improve when we experiment with new technologies and ways of providing care.
- Sending smartphone photos of patients’ rashes to dermatologist for faster diagnoses and treatment
Coming In From the Cold
Packages get where they need to go quickly –instead of piling up outside in the snow
- Supplies and other deliveries are kept safe and secure, delivered quickly and efficiently
- Conduct a motion analysis of sorting and delivering packages
Speak Up, Change a Life
Epilepsy patients benefit from better technology after a doctor and tech team up to advocate for it.
- New testing technology meant better care and less stress for epilepsy patients, all while KP saves money and time.
- Physician and union worker team up to advocate for advanced technology