Consider ‘Day in the Life’ Issues Long Before Healthcare Opening

It’s common to hear the phrase “Day in the Life” (DITL) during the activation of a new healthcare…

Some Healthcare Interactions Can Benefit from Scripted Dialogue

Scripting, or a standardized response, is part of everyday life. Order a cheeseburger, and the…

Taking Command of Capacity Management

Centralized care is emerging to reform patient care operations by generating real-time, actionable…

Top 4 Considerations for Ambulatory Asset Planning

Health systems are seeing changing demands on their existing ambulatory asset portfolio, in both…

The Clinic of the Future

Telehealth visits, plexiglass partitions, taped-off waiting room chairs, hand sanitizer stations,…

Impact of Retail Health and “Non-Traditional” Competitors on Ambulatory Environment

The health sector has experienced tremendous disruption in the past year, but one healthcare trend…

Top Healthcare Design Trends for 2021

To say that 2020 was difficult for hospitals and health systems would be an understatement. COVID-19…

Healthcare Supply Chain: Yesterday, Today, and Tomorrow

Yesterday we had a plan on how to improve our supply chain process. We looked at supplier consolidation,…

The Tipping Point: COVID-19 Positions to End the Decades-long Battle for Telehealth Reimbursement

You don’t necessarily have to be in the healthcare industry to see that COVID-19 has changed the…

Are Hospital Outpatient Surgery Centers Destined to Be the “Radio Star”?

MTV’s 1981 debut of the Buggles’ “Video Killed the Radio Star” instantly changed how we enjoyed…

Predicting the Future of Healthcare Needs

We’ve heard the expression “Hindsight is 20/20,” but that doesn’t mean we have to move forward blindly.…

Integrating Behavioral Healthcare into Our Daily Lives

What if we could be proactive about behavioral health rather than reactive? We cannot control people…

Moving to a New Building? Invest in Change Management

Change management, the controlled implementation of required changes within a system, is a phrase…

Technology’s Impact on Perioperative Spaces

The one thing that the current pandemic is teaching us is that technology is going to play a larger…

Compete or Capitulate – the Argument for Clinic Consolidation

It’s 2020, and everything seems to be experiencing a revolution. Articles use popularized cliché…

Preparing to Respond to The Challenges of COVID-19 – The Second Wave – Part 2

Read Part 1 to learn more about how to coordinate your response to a pandemic. The COVID-19 pandemic…

Preparing to Respond to the Challenges of COVID-19 – The Second Wave – Part 1

The COVID-19 pandemic has elevated the need for the healthcare industry to rethink not only our…

The Support of (and Resistance to) the OR Flip Room

Outside of “How do I (the hospital) improve first case on-time start and room turnover?” the next…

Planning Capex in Today’s Competing Priorities

We live in a world of competing priorities. Your spouse wants you home for dinner, your boss wants…

Keeping Your Healthcare Information Safe

Do you use a smartwatch? Have you ever installed a healthcare, diet, or workout app? Or have you ever…

How Consolidated Service Centers Can Ensure Resources during Healthcare Disasters – Part 2

Read Part 1 to learn how a CSC can protect your supply chain during a public health threat or natural…

How Consolidated Service Centers Can Ensure Resources during Healthcare Disasters – Part 1

The healthcare supply chain is complex, and the role it plays in supporting patient care is critical.…

Reevaluating Critical Care Needs after the Pandemic

Back in August I wrote a piece about the future of ICUs and discussed the unlikely potential of the…

Worrying about Integrating Patients Back into Your Surgical Services?

You stepped up when the crisis demanded. You were there for your community and your patients. Now…

It’s Past Time to Move to Telehealth

If you had not started making shifts toward comprehensive telehealth before the COVID-19 pandemic…

Top 10 Strategic & Operational Trends We Expect Post-COVID-19

The surge of patients caused by COVID-19 will undoubtedly affect how healthcare is delivered once…

Providing a Better Environment for Healthcare Workers

There is nothing like a sudden and drastic change to make you have major epiphanies, and the social…

Managing Access and Flow for Immunocompromised Patients’ Safety

It’s been just over five years since my father died due to complications from acute myeloid leukemia.…

Supporting Patients to Integrate Technology into Their Daily Health

Wearable health technologies are not a new concept. From simple step counters to watches and apps…

Planning in a Time of Constrained Capacity

Health systems, particularly complex areas such as the emergency and surgical services departments,…

The Simple Questions We Ask Big Data

Every day we hear about big data, the need to harness it, and the need to analyze it. In doing so, we…

Activation Readiness: The Devil Is in the Details

In our last blog post on activation planning, we emphasized that implementing even a single process…

How to Stop Throwing Money Out the Window

Healthcare costs in the United States are the highest in the world, accounting for 17% of our GDP…

The Importance of Persona Building

Attending a conference focused on “patient-centered care” means that every session you go to is…

Activation Readiness: Are You Sure You Didn’t Forget Something?

Trying to juggle work, attempts at a social life, staying physically active, and keeping up with…

Harnessing the Power of the Purse through Obstetrics

Women have extensive buying power and influence, driving 70-80% of consumer purchasing.[1] So…

What to Consider When Exploring the Private NICU Model

In a NICU attention is focused first and foremost on the needs of the neonate. For an infant being…

Staying Competitive in Pediatrics Isn’t Child’s Play

Children’s hospitals in a lot of ways face the same challenges that general acute care hospitals…

You Say You Need an Observation Unit?

We often get asked to program and design observation units for clients, whether it’s in the master…

What’s the Future of the ICU? Magic 8 Ball Says…

My favorite find from our recent office move: A Magic 8 Ball. Even after being stored away in a back…

Teleneurology as a Case for Broader Telehealth Adoption

For years telehealth has been an untapped resource for many healthcare organizations due to concerns…

Improving Patient Lives through Telestroke Programs

Strokes affect 800,000 people in the U.S. each year at a cost of $34 billion, according to the CDC.…

Planning Ambulatory Centers for Highest and Best Use – Part 2

As highlighted in part 1 of this blog, rigorous analyses are performed by the Haskell operations…

Planning Ambulatory Centers for Highest and Best Use – Part 1

Ambulatory centers have been touted as convenient locations for patients to take care of clinical,…

Orthopedics’ Continued Shift to the Ambulatory Setting: Developing an Organizational Site-of-Care Strategy

As insurers and patient consumerism drive site-of-care decisions, many orthopedic procedures…

Balancing the Private vs. Semi-Private Conversation

An ongoing debate in inpatient behavioral healthcare has been the benefits of private versus semi-private…

Integrating Behavioral Health into Your Primary Care Clinic

As behavioral health disorders become more prevalent and rise as a national priority, transforming…

What Does Oral Chemo Mean for Your Infusion Space?

Researchers and clinicians are constantly developing and testing new cancer treatments in the…

Three Ways ED Hallway Beds Make Your LOS Longer and Your Staff Less Productive

I’m on a campaign to remove hallway beds from emergency departments across the country. Perhaps…

Total Utilization Is Not an Option

Whether you’re talking about the people, spaces or equipment in an emergency department, one can…

How to Make a Hospital Department Relocation More Successful – Part 2

In Part 1 of this series, we discussed the scope, benefits, and different types of hospital transition…

How to Make a Hospital Department Relocation More Successful – Part 1

Most hospital department leaders receive robust support, strategies, and tools to guide career…

Need To See More Outpatients and Reduce Wait Times but Can’t Build More Space?

Do these sound familiar? Patients must wait more than three weeks for an appointment for a non-urgent…

Four Ways Emergency Physicians Can Improve Patient Flow

Use of Scribes Hospitals increasingly depend on physicians and nurses to capture data to help them…

Why Guess? Know How to Change Hospital Processes with Confidence

If you don’t know for certain that a process change will work before you try it, you’re guessing.…

What If Better Patient Care Means Reduced Hospital Revenues?

Imagine hearing this at a conference: “Success resulted in decreased revenue for our healthcare…

Improving Your Operating Room Efficiency & SURPRISE! Your Profitability

Just as in a lifesaving surgical procedure, every minute counts when optimizing the operating…

Believe These 5 Myths About Facility Condition Assessments at Your Peril

There is a lot of misinformation swirling around about how hospitals can benefit from Facility…

How the Best Nurse Leaders Decide Which Problem to Focus on First

So you think you have a big chaotic mess and don’t know where to start? The Emergency Department (ED)…

How Will You Make Money If You Don’t Know What Nursing Costs?

“We have to cut nursing costs” are dangerous words when we don’t know what it actually costs for nurses…

The Truth About Unscheduled Patients: Predictably Reliable

When you know how many patients are coming down the pipe, you reap more than just shortening their…

How to Prove that Cutting Staff Won’t Actually Save Money

When cutting costs, many hospitals trim less expensive staff, like techs and transporters. You…

Was Your New ED Designed to Fit the Way You Work?

Maybe you have a new emergency department (ED) under construction, or work in a newly built ED. But…

“We just moved in, it’s beautiful, but it doesn’t work!”

After every conference presentation we give, at least one clinical department director will approach…

Bed Shortage? How to Stretch Hospital Capacity – Part 2

Every system has surges in volume, whether they are predictable or unpredictable surges. Most…

Bed Shortage? How to Stretch Hospital Capacity – Part 1

Every system has surges in volume, whether they are predictable or unpredictable surges. Most…

What the iPhone Game “Diner Dash” Taught Me about Optimizing Emergency Department Throughput

Like most people, within hours of purchasing my first iPhone, I discovered game apps. Since that…