Lean Production System & applying to lean managed hospital

By Gabriel Li Velasco; 24 Feb 2014

Lean production is an approach of management that targets on excluding waste while maintaining the quality of production or services and only focused on essential to the processes, such as quantities, units and time by eliminating unnecessary transition. The original concept of lean were developed by Henry Ford then adopted by Toyota manufacture automobile that would enhance the effectiveness of (FTS) and now known as Toyota Production System (TPS) (Verma and Boyer, 2009, Pp.449-450) the aim of elimination waste of lean and Toyota defined three types of waste know as Muda, Muri and Mura.

Those are the waste that adds no value and can be eliminated such as unnecessary financing cost, storage cost and worthless old items. Muda distinguished seven categories that are frequently wasted

ü  (Unnecessary) Transportation – unnecessary movement of information, products or components and unnecessary transport which detects movements

ü  Inventory – inventories, which are only required or needed therefore controlling inventory can save money and space in terms of over stocks of inventory

ü  (Unnecessary) Motion – moving work space will cost time and effort therefore motion is being poor working standard practices

ü  Waiting time – If manufacturing processes are not being transported or processed therefore production time is wasted and it will increase the cost of production. Waiting can cause by poor machinery or poor production line

ü  Over-processing – those are process which has additional steps than required. This may result on error in rework process, poor process design or bad communication and not checking customer requirements.

ü  Over-production – When producing additional product or component could effect rework rate, inventory, processing and waiting as unnecessary motion and transportation

ü  Defects or rework – those are the product or component that are being damage and has to rework of the product. This cause by bad manufacturing process, human or machine errors as a consequence of time and manufacturing cost.

Sources: (Manufactus, 2014)

Muri (English: Overburden): Eliminating overburden of machinery or people, this means that even identifying waste (Muda) there are still chances that could lead to waste due to overwork load, unless limiting project, work capability and capacity of an organization would help the business effectively in other words, staffs or projects are being pressured in the operation can cause defect on the production and this will eventually go through the processes again and time is wasted creating delays therefore unnecessary stress or difficult operation are likely create waste. Limiting it can help the operation workflow more effectively in order to balance other members or machinery to correct standard work. (The Lean Thinker, 2014)

Mura (English: Unevenness or irregularity): focused on eliminating unevenness or irregularities in the production process in order to avoid fluctuation processes in other words uneven demand occur day to day or month to month therefore the production line would sometimes rush or settle down during the operation moreover sometimes people are encourage poor behavior when staffs are idling or under stressed. For example lets assume in week one the customers demand 1,000 products then 10,000 in week two after that 5,000 on week three, usually customers appear to be unpredictable however it does shows pattern that can correct the average that should be produce therefore the best approach to this issue is to balance in order to smoother the production line and more predictable schedule. (Lean manufacturing tool, 2014)

Applying lean to hospitals

Lean is not a list of tool that applies only to factories but also can be applied through hospital as strategy and day-to-day operating approach. The Avera Mckennan Hospital implemented the lean management in the laboratory by using the lean such as eliminating 1000 square feet of space (motion) as a result of productivity increased more than 10% therefore the hospital continues to apply this method and taught lean management to all staffs and every department. It helps also improved patient discharge process, (Waiting time) allowing next patient to use the room preventing overcrowded patient in the waiting line. (Mura) improving unexpected changes helps employees without pressuring them to work faster or sacrificing the quality thus creating standardize work and schedule for employees. (Muri) Overwork condition are more likely to make mistakes that could harm the patients, stressed were caused by the seven aspect of (Muda) we mentioned above, balancing helps the workload allows productivity and quality upgraded. Avera Mckenan has completed lean projects in many departments such, laboratory and histology, pharmacy, emergency department, operative services, business office and health information management and more. Lean management provides effective method for improving safety, quality and cost while preventing delay and increasing employee satisfaction. (OHSU, 2014)