Northwestern Memorial Hospital HIV Clinic

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Northwestern Memorial Hospital HIV Clinic

• December 3rd, 2002

Ben Mahnke Matt Sinn Philipp Goyeneche Steve
Atkins
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Overview of Clinic Project

• HIV AIDS Clinic 13 MDs 4 exam rooms
• Appointment lengths 60/30 to 40/20
• MDs nearly 100 booked Appointments often run
  late Patients frustrated MDs frustrated
• Out of scope MD clinic times, process
  standardization, etc.
• In scope Appointment lengths, patient arrival
  times, patient responsibilities
• All ready to model and no data to model.

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Product Variety vs. Process Flexibility
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The Model

• Sources of variation
• Patients not showing up
• Patients requiring hospital admission
• Patients needing same day treatment
• Patients being late
• Length of time required to treat a patient
• Model of current situation
• All appointments are 20 mins
• Model of variable appointment lengths
• Combination of 15, 20, 25 minute appointments

Current distribution of 12 patients waiting
time (20 minute system)
Models were of clinic schedules ( 12 patients,
240 minutes) We used _at_ Risk to run through 1,000
iterations for each model
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Recommendations

• Flexible appointment lengths
• Reduced patient wait time
• Increased MD downtime
• of MDs per clinic
• Patient ahead-scheduling
• Regular meetings

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Key takeaways

• Difficulty to make operational recommendations in
  a non-operational focused environment
• Challenge to in depth quantitative analysis with
  very little data.
• A lot of low hanging fruit, but beware of changes
  that are not for discussion (have patients come
  10 min early standardize doctor patient
  appointment procedures)
• Logistic consequences of implementation
  (scheduling)