Delivering high-quality patient care is at the heart of every healthcare organization. But growing industry challenges are making that goal harder to achieve.
From staffing shortages to disconnected IT systems and other operational bottlenecks, healthcare providers are under increasing pressure to improve efficiency while maintaining quality of care. The good news is that these challenges can be addressed with the right strategy and technology. Partner with CGI to build a more efficient, connected healthcare organization.
What is the goal of operational efficiency in healthcare?
In the United States alone, over $760B is wasted on unnecessary procedures, treatment errors and other administrative mistakes. This doesn’t have to be the case. Healthcare operational efficiency refers to maximizing workforce productivity and enhancing patient care, while minimizing the costs, waste and mundane workplace issues.
Though the exact approach varies, working towards healthcare efficiency typically involves streamlining workflows, optimizing resource allocation and adopting state-of-the-art technologies to improve patient data and enable better decision making. When you partner with a technology consultant, they’ll tailor a plan for healthcare operational efficiency that is unique to the needs of your company.
Seven benefits of operational efficiency in healthcare:
- Improves patient outcomes and safety: Streamlining workflows minimizes errors and enables faster, more accurate diagnostics and treatment plans to shorten a patient’s length of stay.
- Reduces operational costs: Automating administrative tasks, reducing overall waste and optimizing inventory lowers everyday expenses, bolstering your organization’s financial stability.
- Addresses the workforce crisis: Eliminating busy work and making processes easier to manage helps your staff avoid burnout and refocus on providing the best possible patient care.
- Enhances patient experience: Efficiently scheduling and reducing the wait times for processes leads to higher patient satisfaction scores.
- Creates a more agile environment: Being able to make immediate data-driven decisions and reduce administrative burden makes room for continuous improvements in patient care.
- Ensures better resource utilization: Tracking staff, equipment and beds in near real-time ensures the optimal use of resources, saving you time and money in the long run.
- Strengthens regulatory compliance: Efficiently automating data capture secures accurate documentation for future audits and ensures everything meets the industry’s current regulatory standards.
What are the main barriers to healthcare efficiency?
As with any application of efficiency, the healthcare industry faces systemic, financial, operational and technical challenges that reduce the value of care and increase operational costs. While outdated IT systems, workplace cultural resistance and inefficient bottlenecks account for a large share of the barriers, one of the most common issues is the widespread shortage of doctors, nurses and specialists.
When staffing issues arise, the quality of care and employee retention rates plummet. Investing in healthcare operational efficiency can help.
What’s the difference between healthcare provider efficiency and healthcare payer efficiency?
The healthcare industry is a complex ecosystem comprising key stakeholders. To fully transform your organization, you’ll need to focus equally on healthcare efficiency for two key players: healthcare providers and healthcare payers.
- Healthcare provider efficiency focuses more on the systems and workflows that affect the physicians, nurses, hospitals, clinics and other staff members responsible for offering direct care to patients. Between performing surgeries, diagnosing illnesses and managing overall patient health, providers have enough on their hands. Investing in healthcare provider efficiency makes their jobs easier and enables them to focus solely on patient care.
- Healthcare payer efficiency directly impacts the financial side of your organization. Insurance companies, government programs such as Medicare and employers who offer health benefits to their staff are primarily responsible for processing claims and paying for patient services. Investing in automated technology and working out the kinks in healthcare payer efficiency results in reduced administrative costs, curbed expenses and more customized member experiences.
How can you achieve operational efficiency in healthcare?
Improving healthcare efficiency requires a deep understanding of your existing systems and processes. That’s why most organizations choose to outsource this responsibility to experienced technology consulting firms. But whether you choose to attempt it on your own or partner with a third-party provider, healthcare operational efficiency is dependent on three specific areas: technology, workflows and resource allocation.
Key strategies for healthcare operational efficiency:
- Standardizing workflows: Implementing uniform patient care protocols to improve reliability and reduce errors.
- Investing in interoperability: Developing seamless communication between existing systems and Electronic Health Records (EHRs).
- Implementing telehealth: Adding remote care options, including primary care appointments and off-premises patient monitoring, to increase accessibility to care and reduce strain on physical facilities.
- Automating supply chain: Using automated inventory systems to track resource usage, prevent medical shortages and reduce overall waste.
- Deploying artificial intelligence: Switching to artificial intelligence to enable predictive maintenance, make scheduling easy, process claims faster, free up staff and support diagnostic efforts.
- Streamlining patient intake: Perfecting admission, transfer and discharge processes to reduce bottlenecks and make end-to-end patient care easy.
- Optimizing physician time: Utilizing technology and tools to augment admin work to maximize time spent with patients.
- Cross-training staff: Involving employees early on in the healthcare efficiency process with well-rounded training programs to prepare them for all changes.
- Asset tracking: Adding real-time location systems on mobile equipment to reduce time spent searching for devices.
How is healthcare operational efficiency measured?
Putting in the time and energy to enhance healthcare efficiency is one thing; making sure it’s successful is another. When assessing its effectiveness within your organization, you’ll need to look at a few key metrics.
10 common KPIs used to measure healthcare efficiency:
- Bed turnover rate
- Wait times
- No-show rate
- Average length of stay
- Net collection rate
- Claims denial rate
- Medical equipment utilization percentage
- Staff-to-patient ratio
- Readmission rate
- Patient satisfaction index
Why choose CGI for your healthcare efficiency consulting firm
With decades of experience, the consultants at CGI provide an impartial, outsider perspective, the latest advanced technology and a unique approach to every single organization. We understand that patient care is your number one priority—and we’re prepared to help improve it every step of the way.
CGI’s tools for achieving operational efficiency in healthcare providers and payers:
CGI ProperPay: A holistic payment integrity solution designed to identify and ensure that claims and payments are accurate.
EMR Systems: Electronic medical record systems that consider the need for integrated platforms, update old processes that are no longer suitable for patient communication and the use of various systems and data sources.
Healthcare analytics: Harnessing the power of data through data operationalization, implementing AI and ML, tracking performance, benchmarking and more to deliver valuable, high-quality and accessible healthcare services.
Partner with CGI today
Connect with a CGI consultant today to achieve ultimate healthcare efficiency in your workplace.
