Workflow and Process Design Flashcards

A healthcare organization wants to sustain process improvements after a Lean project concludes. Which tool is MOST effective for ensuring the new standard is maintained?

Answer: Standard work documentation and visual management

Standard work documentation paired with visual management (e.g., visual cues, posted workflows) embeds the new process into daily operations and makes deviations immediately visible.

A clinical team redesigns their medication reconciliation workflow and implements the change. Three months later, compliance has dropped back to old patterns. This phenomenon is known as:

Answer: Process entropy

Process entropy refers to the natural tendency of systems and behaviors to revert toward disorder or previous states without active control mechanisms in place.

In healthcare workflow design, 'load leveling' (Heijunka) aims to:

Answer: Distribute work evenly over time to prevent peaks and idle periods

Heijunka smooths production volume and variety across a work period, preventing feast-or-famine cycles that lead to overburden or underutilization.

A process improvement team is conducting a Gemba walk. The PRIMARY purpose of a Gemba walk is to:

Answer: Observe the actual work environment and processes where they occur

A Gemba walk involves going to the actual place of work ('Gemba' means 'real place') to observe processes firsthand, gather data, and identify waste not visible from reports.

Which of the following represents a 'pull' signal in a healthcare kanban system?

Answer: A visual card or bin that signals replenishment only when stock is consumed

A kanban card or empty bin acts as a pull signal, triggering replenishment only when actual consumption creates need, preventing overstock and shortages.

A CHL is redesigning patient flow using the Theory of Constraints. After identifying the constraint (bottleneck), the next step is to:

Answer: Subordinate all other processes to support the constraint's throughput

The Theory of Constraints directs that once a bottleneck is identified, all other process steps must be subordinated to maximize the throughput of that constraint before adding resources.

A process design team is using affinity diagrams to organize staff feedback collected during a workflow redesign project. Affinity diagrams are BEST used for:

Answer: Grouping large volumes of qualitative ideas into meaningful themes

Affinity diagrams organize large sets of qualitative data (ideas, observations, complaints) by natural groupings, helping teams synthesize complex information into actionable themes.