The Impact of a Process Improvement Program on Healthcare Staff: A Qualitative Case Study

Healthcare facilities are continuously evolving because of regulations and protocols. Healthcare facilities began adopting Lean and Six-sigma techniques to become a more effective and efficient system. The Veterans Affairs, much like privatized healthcare facilities, are continually evolving to meet requirements to new regulations as well as acts passed down from congress. The Veterans Affairs is devoted in creating a culture of safety, quality, and efficiency has never been more important due to the Veterans Access, Choice, and Accountability Act of 2014. The problem is that many Veterans Affairs medical staff lacks the skills necessary to achieve effective and efficient improvements within the medical facility. The VA-TAMMCS framework was developed as a process improvement model designed to provide the medical staff with the skills necessary to make improvements within the Veterans Affairs. This qualitative, single site case study examined medical staff perceptions with the VA-TAMMCS framework to understand how these competencies affected their daily operations, behaviors, practices, and build collegiality with other medical departments. A purposeful random sampling method was used to obtain the sample population from medical staff that taken the VA-TAMMCS program training. Semi-structured, open-ended interviews were conducted with 10 medical staff employees in a region one Veterans Affairs Medical Center. ATLAS.ti was used to store, code, organize and analyze the data. Findings from the study included themes relating medical staffs' perceptions of the impact of the system redesign (VA-TAMMCS framework) program. The first research question focused on the training program which resulted in themes such as having a preconceived notion of the perception of training, an effective beneficial concept, and an approach changing experience. The second research question focused on the effect of the system redesign perspective that resulted in themes such as day-to-day behaviors changed with a problem solving approach, the day-to-day operations changed behaviors, and a directional positive experience improving processes. The third research question focused on collegiality that resulted in themes such as the departments having an understanding of the improvements and positive interaction between colleagues. The fourth research question focused on the future of the program that resulted in themes such as uncertainty on the spreading of the program and encouragement to sustain their improvements. The fifth research question focused on the staff practices and efficiencies that resulted in themes of enhanced professionalism, increased capacity, and lacking exertion. Future research should study the comparison of healthcare-like organizations and process improvement techniques involving internal teaching comparative to contracted vendor teaching.