Medicine and Health Sciences Commons^™

Increasing First Case On Time Starts In An Ambulatory Surgery Center, Diane Fecteau, Shannan Reid, Sydney Green, Ruth Hanselman, Suneela Nayak, Stephen Tyzik, Amy Sparks

Operations Transformation

In an ambulatory surgical center, first case on-time starts directly affects the patient experience. In addition, in order to treat as many patients as possible, delays of first case on-time starts negatively impacts the rest of scheduled surgical patients and increases staff overtime expenditures. An ambulatory surgical team within a large urban health care system initiated a performance improvement initiative to enhance the patient experience, increase staff accountability and care team well-being.

The goal of this project was to start 70% or more first cases on time. Baseline metrics demonstrated that patients and surgeons were the largest cause of delay. …

Improving Hand Surgery Pain Management Results Using A Key Phrase And Patient Feedback: A Quality Improvement Project In A United States Ambulatory Surgery Site, Janet E. Reilly, Brenda Tyczkowski, Stacie Murley

Journal of Perioperative Nursing

Objective: The objective of this study was to report changes in patient pain satisfaction and quality indicator scoring of post-operative pain using key phrasing, or standardised scripts, as the nursing intervention.

Sample/setting: Data was collected from an ambulatory surgery clinic in an American non-profit, 185-bed community hospital which is part of a nationally ranked health system.

Method: This study used a before-and-after design in which quality improvement data was collected from the Press Ganey™ ambulatory surgery surveys completed by patients undergoing hand surgery. Changes in outcomes were measured three months before and during the key phrase intervention.

Results: Data indicated …