How to fix healthcare #1 = Fix the process of healthcare delivery.

I look at almost everything in life as a process. For the most part, there are predictable steps that occur when doing something– going to the grocery store, checking your email, going out to dinner with friends, building cars, etc..

The opportunity lies in designing processes. When you design processes, you can analyze each step and ask yourself, “What could potentially go wrong?” at each step. Then, through more analysis and creativity, you can whittle away at the steps in processes and design out the potential for error.

Almost two years ago, I started my original practice in Williamsburg based on this principle. I sat down and thought from a patient’s perspective, what are the steps patients must take to receive healthcare from a primary care physician? I developed the flow map of an old school, traditional office visit on the left. The time frame isn’t labeled but it’s often weeks to possibly months.

Then I thought about how we can streamline this process so that patients could simply have a more pleasurable, more informative, and more effective visit with their doctor. So I created the flow map on the right. It’s a very early thought experiment, but the time frame is significantly shortened to the amount of time it takes for a doctor to order a test and receive the results– normally about 24 hours. Much of this process is baked into Hello Health.

Weeks to months down to maybe a day? More communication. More efficiency. More effective healthcare.

This is how we should be reforming healthcare–from the ground up– carefully architecting processes to make things work better with less complexity and more value.

Patient Flow http://d.scribd.com/ScribdViewer.swf?document_id=19155221&access_key=key-19q04suagdggr9x642b2&page=1&version=1&viewMode=