Shouldice Hospital Essay Example

Shouldice Hospital Essay Example Shouldice Hospital Essay Shouldice Hospital Essay Q1: How does shouldice compete? In other words why do patients come to shouldice hospital? Two main reasons drive customers into choosing Shouldice over other competitors/hospitals. The first is quality, and the other is cost. talking about quality of the Shouldice â€Å"product† includes both, quality of the operation, and quality of post operation activities and overall services offered by Shouldice. The Shouldice method is a focused, specified operation that deals with Hernias, with a reputation that has been built throughout the years and is still growing; the hospital doesn’t even use advertisement to attract patients, the â€Å"word of mouth† way of advertisement has been doing very well for them so far. The superior quality offered by the Shouldice method, gives the patients a motive to operate at Shouldice for what it gives regarding peace of mind, low risk and low recurrence rates. Away from the in-operation excellence in quality, the services that Shouldice hospital offers are more tempting than other hospitals. Patients do not feel that they are in a hospital; they consider it more like a recovery vacation with an excused absence from work without feeling any guilt in that. How do you count for its performance ? The Shouldice Method * Specializes in external hernias only. * Is a 45 minute procedure for first time repairs, * And a 90 minute procedure for recurrences of hernias previously repaired elsewhere. * Involves separation of muscle layers and six rows of sutures in an overlapping fashion resulting in a reinforced muscular wall. * Typically, only requires use of a sleeping pill, a pain killer, and a local anesthetic allowing for immediate post-op ambulation rapid recovery. The Patient Experience * Appointments are driven by patient referrals. * Patients are encouraged to self-diagnose to avoid a visit. * The experience requires only one or two visits. * A typical length of stay is about 3 days. * All rooms are semiprivate, and patients are grouped with someone of like interest. * Patients nearing discharge help orient new patients arriving. * Surgery occurs on day 2. * Patients walk from the operating table to the post-op room (with some help from surgeons), * For psychological and physiological reasons * And are encouraged to exercise regularly, explore the premises and make new friends. * Patients were so fond of their experience that they sometimes asked if they could stay an extra day. * The most common after-effect in summer is sunburn! The Nurse Experience * Shouldice employs 34 full-time equivalent (FTE) nurses on staff. * The ratio of nurses to patients is 1:15, compared to 1:4 in Canadian acute-care hospitals. * Nurses spend an unusually large amount of time providing counseling services to patients. * Due to low nurse turnover, there is a waiting list of nurses wanting to work at Shouldice. * Competition is constantly short-staffed. The Doctor Experience * 10 full time surgeons, * 8 part-time assistants, * 2 anesthetists on site, * 30-36 operations per day. * Each surgeon performs 3-4 surgeries per day. * Salary is $144k + bonus (15% over competition). * Surgeon’s typically work 7:30 – 4:00 M-F. * On call 1 weekday night in 10, 1 weekend in 10 * Better quality of life than most surgeon schedules * Consequently, turnover is low. The Facility * The facility is designed so patients have to walk in order to do things they need or want to do. * Rooms are not equipped with phone or TV. * Patients must travel to make a phone call, watch TV, socialize, eat, etc. * Small rise stairways make it easier on patients who have just completed surgery. * Carpeting makes it feel warm and comfortable. * Patients and staff eat together in the cafeteria. * Food all fresh ingredients and prepared from scratch. The Administration * No one is fired! Turnover is low. * Staff is non-union. * Pay scale is higher than the competition. * Profit sharing plans are in place for doctors and staff. * Cross-training teamwork are strong. * Managing director stays late one night per week to interact with patients and staff. The Market * 1 million hernia operations in the US in 2000. * Most commonly performed on males. * Shouldice has a backlog of 2400 growing. * Relies entirely on word-of-mouth advertising. * Rates are reasonable. * Annual checkups are provided for alumni free of charge. * Annual reunion of patients draws about 1000. What actions to take to expand the hospitals capacity ? Consider becoming a teaching hospital to provide a new revenue stream and spread the Shouldice technique around the world. Consider performing surgeries on weekends. Provide training for leadership staff, to overcome the concerns about compromised quality control of operations with expansion. Develop resilience skills of all staff and leadership skills for administration. Hire new staff with the understanding of the new operating hours. It is highly recommended to adopt Saturday working option with some minor modifications. The existing procedure needs to be synchronized with the various activities and to be well planned. How would you implement the changes you propose ? * Admission of patients to be made on Sundays with the available administrative staff. * During the peak period of operations, use the 14 hostel rooms available in the third floor for accommodating the patients. * Incentives to doctors, nurses and other staff for the Saturday working days to be paid twice that of normal days. * Successor for Dr. Obney from the existing experienced doctors to be done within six months. * A general meeting is going to be scheduled to discuss the expansion. * Feedback and suggestions would be gathered from the overall staff. * Employees would be allowd to work flexibly.