Improving Productivity in United General's Emergency Department

Productivity Metrics

You have been hired as a consultant to increase productivity in United General’s emergency department. Your consulting engagement entails evaluating productivity metrics for the emergency room (ER), creating a balanced scorecard to measure the department’s performance, and then presenting recommendations to the leaders of the emergency department.

As a first step in your consulting engagement, you review Ron’s experience in the ER. Using information from the case study, evaluate Ron’s experience and summarize your findings against national standards as follows:

1.Identify 10 activities or processes carried out during Ron’s visit to United General. Enter the 10 activities or processes and their duration in the “Productivity Metrics Dashboard.”

2.Write an analysis of activities and processes that create inefficiency as follows:

a.Identify five activities or processes that create inefficiency in the emergency department.

b.Provide a rationale for your selection of the five activities or processes.

5.Identify any discrepancies and outline reasons why discrepancies exist.

3.Write an analysis of how inefficiencies reflect national averages as follows:

a.Use benchmarks determined by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services to identify the national averages for the five selected activities or processes.

b.Enter the national benchmarks in the “Productivity Metrics Dashboard.”

c.Include the sources for all data in the sources tab in the “Productivity Metrics Dashboard.”

4.Write an analysis of acceptable differentials for each activity as follows:

a.Determine an acceptable differential to the national benchmark for each activity or process and enter the differentials into the “Productivity Metrics Dashboard.”

b.Explain the methodology you used to determine acceptable differentials for each of the metrics for these five activities.

The next step in your consulting engagement is creating a balanced scorecard but, first, you must convince the executive committee that the balanced scorecard method is effective. Several members of the executive committee are not familiar with the process. An important part of your role is to educate them. You decide to show them a sample balanced scorecard for an emergency department.

Create a 7- to 8-slide presentation that explains the balanced scorecard methodology, including its strengths and limitations, and the benefits of using the balanced scorecard methodology in United General Hospital’s emergency department.

After you explain the balanced scorecard methodology, the board and chief executive officer (CEO) want you to create a 3- to 4-page balanced scorecard for the emergency department at United General.

1.Create a balanced scorecard for United General’s emergency department. Include both quantitative and qualitative metrics. (1 page)

2.Explain why you selected these metrics for United General and how you identified the targets. (2–3 pages)

Now that the balanced scorecard is created, compile the productivity measures identified in the United General Emergency Department and create a 15- to 17-slide presentation for the executive committee with productivity recommendations. Include the following:

1.An explanation and defense of best practices used for collecting data for a productivity metrics dashboard

2.An explanation and defense of best practices used for analyzing and acting on the data

3.An explanation and critique of United General Hospital’s productivity metrics results (from Part I) and any limitations of the current data collection process and/or metrics being used

4.Recommendations for a high-level process to collect, track, and measure data for the metrics that represent United General’s emergency department’s productivity