Application of engineering methods for chest pain patients

Lean production is a multidimensional approach, using a variety of management practices, like standardization and cellular manufacturing to reduce variation. In the industrial world, these methods were found to increase efficiency. In the health care system, it is unclear whether these methods help improve patient care and cost reduction. In medicine, there are physicians who claim that these methods restrict their discretion and thus negatively impact the quality of their medical care. The goal of this study was to investigate the possibility of using lean production for heart disease treatment. Heart disease is the leading cause of mortality in the western world. It is estimated that between 3.5% - 11% of the patients with chest pain are mistakenly discharged from the Emergency Department (ED). In this study we applied standardization and cellular manufacturing for chest pain patients-standardization in the ED and cellular manufacturing in the general ward. We checked the effect of these principles on the quality of the care provided to the patients and on the hospital expenses.