Workflow Optimization in an Ambulatory Environment

Maximizing your Organizational Efficiency through Standardization of Work Processes

Standardized workflow is critical to increasing productivity and creating a user-friendly and easy-to-monitor clinical environment. The fast-paced and dynamic ambulatory healthcare setting (including a single physician practice, group practice, or complex community health center offering services ranging from primary care and behavioral health to dental and ophthalmic services) has its own unique set of challenges.

  

Optimizing workflows to incorporate health IT in an ambulatory setting calls for a unique set of expertise. On one hand, the processes need to be sufficiently rigorous to achieve required organizational and operational efficiencies; on the other hand, they need to be flexible to allow urgencies and exceptions to be handled when necessary.

 

 

 

A typical process optimization cycle consists of the following elements:

• Map processes as they currently exist, including problems
• Identify risks and barriers associated with each process
• Mitigate risks and barriers associated with each process
• Identify opportunities for improvement
• Map optimized processes
• Keep record / evaluation of improvements made