You can see the quote from the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality on almost any Web page devoted to quality improvement: Quality health care means doing the right thing at the right time in the right way for the right person and having the best possible results.
Even though hes an advisor for the Institute for Healthcare Improvement (IHI), Richard Scoville, PhD, is quick to tell you that Lean management or its related iterations in healthcare, Virginia Masons management system and Sutter Healths adaptation of it are really quite good.
If you ask someone familiar with Lean management systems to name one of the things that makes those systems different from more traditional healthcare management, he or she may very well mention that leadership makes it a point to head to the front lines regularly.
If you are an accredited hospital, you already know what to do if Ebola comes to your door. At least thats the theory. But what we think we know how to do, and what actually happens may not always coincide.
