Time to wait: a systematic review of strategies that affect out-patient waiting times.

Conclusions Strategies to align resources, increase operational efficiency and improve processes provide a comprehensive approach that may reduce out-patient waiting times.What is known about the topic? Out-patient waiting times are a challenge in most countries that seek to provide universal access to health care for all citizens. Although there has been extensive research in this area, many patients still experience extensive delays accessing specialist care, particularly in the public health sector. The multiple factors that contribute to bottlenecks and inefficiencies in the referral process and affect patient waiting times are often poorly understood.What does this paper add? This paper reviews the published healthcare literature to identify strategies that affect specialist out-patient waiting times for patients. The findings suggest that there are numerous operational strategies that affect waiting times. These strategies may be categorised into three overarching themes (resource alignment, operational efficiencies and out-patient processes) that, when actioned in a coordinated approach, have the potential to significantly reduce out-patient waiting times.What are the implications for practitioners? This paper identifies evidence-based strategies for aligning resources, improving operational efficiency and streamlining processes, which may provide improvements to specialist out-patient waiting times for patients. Addressing the identified organisational, person-related...

Source: Australian Health Review - March 30, 2017 Category: Hospital Management Authors: Naiker U, FitzGerald G, Dulhunty JM, Rosemann M Tags: Aust Health Rev Source Type: research