Purdue Healthcare Advisors extends lean training to a nationwide market with the launch of its first online, lean process improvement course

WEST LAFAYETTE ― Purdue Healthcare Advisors (PHA) will use PHA Direct, the e-learning platform it launched earlier this year, to expand access for the training and certification of Lean Daily Improvement Facilitators. 

“Today’s technology allows us to share across the country what Purdue University experts have learned through a decade of coaching and training health care workers, many who have limited resources to make the changes necessary to support high-quality care and meet the requirements of state and federal compliance programs,” said PHA Director Randy Hountz, MSM. “In hundreds of cases, we’ve proved that Lean Daily Improvement (LDI) can reduce costs and increase revenue for clinics and hospitals as well as improve quality measures, clinical outcomes, and patient satisfaction.”

Now clinicians, administrators and practice managers, and others working in health care ― regardless of their location — can study to become a certified LDI facilitator. The course is part of Lean Immersion, a new, online training, coaching, and community-building program offered by PHA and the Regenstrief Center for Healthcare Engineering at Purdue. Lean Immersion serves to address barriers to performance improvement specific to health care, such as complex processes, subtle people-to-people interactions, and behavior-change challenges. Course registration is open and ongoing.

Trained LDI facilitators will be able to make systematic, small-step changes while work is being done, and sustain the gains that have been made through other change efforts. They will be equipped with the knowledge and tools to identify a problem to solve; choose a key performance metric; collect and display data visually; run team huddles to get to root causes; assign corrective actions; and keep the process moving on a daily or weekly basis. 

Providing organizations with a way for their lean teams to make small but meaningful daily adjustments in order to move or hold a metric is an essential part of a lean strategy, according to PHA senior adviser Jack Fenton, BBM, LSSGB, LGC. 

“LDI constitutes a level of lean training that resonates well with our clients because it’s simple, straightforward, and satisfying to those who are doing the work,” Fenton said. “LDI is not a rapid improvement event, a value stream analysis, Six Sigma or data science, but rather a team-based, continuous process improvement at the point of service … the place where health care organizations most need process-improvement support to build lean capacity.” 

LDIF course participants may choose to complete the online training first to earn a digital badge, a recognized credential from Purdue. They have the option, but no obligation, to upgrade to complete the requirements for full certification. Coursework consists of online learning modules; quizzes; discussion; hands-on exercises; reflective practice; and contribution to Connect, PHA Direct’s online community that houses tools and real-world, process-improvement case studies. Certification includes the training component plus successful completion of applied work 

While the LDI facilitator course introduces lean methodologies that allow point-of-service teams to take ownership of and rework the process, the Lean Behavior Change facilitator course set to launch in 2019 focuses on developing the soft skills (i.e., interpersonal skills or "people skills") needed for the process to work. Learn more about the program at https://pha.purdue.edu/lean-immersion/. 

About Purdue Healthcare Advisors

Purdue Healthcare Advisors (PHA) is a not-for-profit outreach initiative from Purdue University’s Regenstrief Center for Healthcare Engineering that serves the training, project facilitation, and assessment needs of the healthcare industry to increase cost savings and better the patient-care environment. PHA strives to improve patient care by enabling health care organizations to build capacity for change. PHA’s lean process improvement, quality reporting, and/or health IT services are focused on rural communities as well as practices, federally qualified health centers, critical access hospitals and rural hospitals, and other small and under-resourced providers. 

Sources:

Randy Hountz, MSM, Director, Purdue Healthcare Advisors, (765) 494-0766; rhountz@purdue.edu

Jack Fenton, BBM, LSSGB, LGC, Senior Advisor-Lean Healthcare, Purdue Healthcare Advisors, (419) 957-4390; fentonj@purdue.edu 

Media Contact:

Jeanine Parsch, Managing Advisor-Communications & Marketing, (765) 337-7047; jeanine@purdue.edu 

Related News Release:

4/26/2018 - Purdue launches online platform to prepare health care professionals in lean and people skill development