Hospital Programs

IHO Variability Methodology^® services and other operations management (OM) tools and techniques can be applied to improve operations and optimally managing patient flow wherever different patient types (for example, urgent, emergent and scheduled) co-mingle, steps in the care delivery process are interconnected and there is a sharing of common resources. The Operating Room, Cardiac Catheterization Lab and Inpatient units typically exhibit all of these characteristics.

Operating Room and Cardiac Catheterization Lab services can benefit from our services in ensuring that there is both high utilization of elective blocks and that urgent/emergent procedures are done within acceptable wait times. See examples here >

In addition to the OR, medical flow from direct and ED admissions, can also cause artificial variability and can greatly benefit from our services. See examples here >

In the Obstetrical service area, competition for OR resources and beds can occur when natural child birth procedures compete with scheduled inductions and C-sections. The same principle that calls for separating main OR resources for scheduled and unscheduled surgical flows is relevant in the Obstetrical service area as well.

IHO’s expertise and methodologies can also be applied to manage the competing demands for inpatient beds between the OR or Cath Lab and ED patients, as well as many other service areas including imaging and other ancillary services.

We assist hospitals in a variety of formats:

Multi-hospital collaboratives

In this format, we bring together a number of hospitals interested in employing IHO Variability Methodology^® services in a particular setting such as the operating room or inpatient units. These programs provide extensive education and coaching for various levels of managers at hospitals to enable them to redesign their patient flow. Participating hospitals benefit not only from our Faculty’s expertise but also from learning from each other as they work through implementation issues. If you are interested in participating in a collaborative, please contact us.

Individual hospital support

In some instances, we work with individual hospitals to help them assess and redesign patient flow. These hospitals are carefully selected based on their unique needs, as well as the Institute’s ability to advance the science and application of patient flow variability management. If you are interested in applying to be considered, please contact us.