Research Of Business Process Reengineering Of Outpatient Department In A Public Hospital

The existing processes of outpatient department in public hospitals are mostly the processes descended from years ago,which have a problem of not designed from the point of patients.Instead,it left the patients to adapt the processes themselves.Therefore,the processes bring about lots of inconvenience to patients and result in disorder in some areas of the hospital's work,which give rise to the overcrowding in outpatient department.Behind the phenomenon,it is the fact that the effective treatment time of the patients is short,approximately accounting for only 10 percent.If we could raise the effective treatment time up to 30 percent,the turnaround time of the patients would reduce by two thirds.To curtail the unnecessary waiting time of the patients could not only ease the overcrowding phenomenon,but also conserve social resources.The reason why patients stay for a long time in the outpatient department is mostly related to that the patients are unfamiliar to the hospital environment and that the procedure of treatment is unreasonable.The uneven distribution of treatment time,the uneven flow distribution of the patients,the lack of guidance in treatment and the lack of foreseeability are caused by the existing processes'single consideration of the convenience of doctors instead of the patients.With the gradual deepening of our country's medical system reform,the reform of outpatient processes is imperative.The experience of hospitals in developed countries and regions provides with valuable reference to domestic hospitals.After the introduction of BPR to their hospital management,they achieved some success in the aspects of raising the level of hospital management,improving the quality of health care service,improving doctor-patient relationship,etc.The theory is still in the exploration and pilot study phase in domestic hospital management,so there is also great space sublimation.How to integrate the advanced theory–BPR with the reality of domestic hospitals then develop the BPR which fits our hospitals'implementation turn to be a challenge in the face of our current health care academics and hospital managers.By the means of application research,we could recognize the defects of domestic hospitals in the aspects of institutional setting,resource allocation,management philosophy and system construction,then targetedly optimize all the aspects above one by one.The effects of Optimization of resource allocation,perfect system,standardization of diagnosis and treatment and continuous quality improvement could be realized through the effort of raising outpatient satisfaction,improving the efficiency of treatment and continuously improving assessments.All the effort done above help to solve the problem of inadequate and unaffordable medical services which has troubled the patients for many years,and,ultimately,enhance the competitiveness of the hospitals.The research target of this article,which lies in Jilin Province,is a state-owned,non-profit and large comprehensive three-level first-class hospital,integrated with medical, teaching, research, prevention, care and rehabilitation.Large organizational scale,complex organizational structure and huge outpatient flow are three main features of the hospital.Because of the conventional management methods and complex outpatient procedures,the overcrowding of the outpatient department and hardly timely consultation were common phenomena,which caused a number of complaints by the patients,overshadowing to the long-term development of the hospital.Meanwhile,the fierce competition from other hospitals in the province led to a downward trend of the number of customer.In order to avoid the loss of customer,attract more customer,survive and develop the hospital and,ultimately,provide patients with higher-quality of health care services,I rethink and redesign the outpatient procedures,combining the theories of BPR with CRM.With the method of questionnairing,interviewing patients and some hospital staffs,tracking the whole outpatient process and measuring the time of the process,I diagnosed the shortcomings of the existing outpatient procedures,then redesigned the process under the guidance of BPR and CRM,supporting with IT systems.The new process eliminates many intermediate links of the existing process.Patients,after only several steps,such as (appointment)register,(test),waiting hall and finally visiting doctor,could complete the whole treatment process.Through assessment,the turnaround time of patients(from register to leaving) would reduce to 45 minutes,while,the turnaround time of the existing process is 110 minutes,with 60 percent reduction of the average turnaround time.At the same time,the effective treatment time is expected to raise from the present 14 percent to 35 percent,and the average waiting time is expected to reduce from the present 21 minutes to 6 minutes.With the help of patients reception center,the efficiency of register is expected to increase by 40 percent.With the application of EMRS and PACS,the efficiency of clinical laboratory(including X-ray,CT,DSA,MRI,etc.) is expected to increase by 60 percent,and the efficiency of clinical doctors 50 percent.With the perfection of PMS and its integration with EMRS,the efficiency of pharmacy is expected to raise by 58 percent.With the informationization of the outpatient process,the total amount of paper documents is expected to be reduced by 80%,which would bring about strengthening of important information storage function and lowing operating costs.The new computer system would realize the joint of laboratory(including blood test,urine test,etc.) system with EMRS,which is expected to further raise the laboratory efficiency by 33 percent.With the optimization of the process and the humanization of the services,the degree of satisfaction of the patients is expected to be raised from the present 75 percent to a dramatic 98 percent.The construction of patient feedback system,the tracking investigation and humane care of the hospital to the patients,both of which would narrow the distance between hospital and patients,and raise the degree of satisfaction as well as establish a good image of the hospital.This article initially integrates BPR with CRM,which truly reflects the work of patient-centered objectives,integrating the exiting resources and introduce IT system which could help to improve outpatient process.The application of PMS,QMS,PACS and EMRS would construct an entire network inside the hospital,which could dramatically improve outpatient process,thus dramatically improve the efficiency.The combination of EMRS with telephone network construct a telephone customer service system,and the integration of EMRS with internet build the network service platform.Both of the two platforms will be use to register and feedback.Transforming several charging processes to one single step and establishing bank POS terminals in the charge office are expected to bring dramatic convenience to patients.The exploration of establishing personal bank account of private medical insurance meet the development trend of the future hospital,whick needs the combination of EMRS with bank systems,making bank to be fund settlement center of hospital,extension of e-commerce systems to the hospital,would dramatically improve the efficiency of hospital.