“SmartCAR™ CASE STUDY: Process Improvement Relieves Department Problems”
The medical records department was struggling at Covenant Medical Center - Lakeside, Lubbock, TX. Shelves were 100 percent full. Every evening, record clerks spent so much time shifting files they couldn't complete their work. Files were stacked everywhere."We were drowning and it looked like we were incompetent," recalled Medical Records Director Lyn Moore, "but it was really just a space problem." Moore gained responsibility for Covenant-Lakeside (formerly St. Mary's of the Plains) last year after a merger with Methodist Hospital formed Covenant Health System.
Two filing rooms--one upstairs and one in the basement--each contained complete systems of digits 00-99. Misfiles were chronic.
The microfilm retrieval system was dysfunctional, too. Fifty three-ring notebooks comprised the film index. "For some patients as many as 50 different locations had been penciled in," Moore recalled.
In addition, the medical staff was constantly complaining about poor retrieval times, and clients complained that copies were unreadable. The microfilm had serious quality problems, recalled Irene Leos, ART, incoming evening medical records supervisor for Lakeside. "I felt I was responsible for this film being reproducible many years down the line," Leos said. "I told Lyn I would not sign off to destroy the originals."
Moore had to find a solution.
"A lot of work needed to be done in that department, and most of it required my time," Moore recalled. Purging the file room was something she could delegate, however, and gaining shelf space was a first step toward solving many department problems.
Moore didn't have time to do a request for proposal but she had been happy with work previously done by EDCO – The Document People®, Springfield, MO. After her vice president and executive vice president toured the department, they both agreed to Moore's plan.
"I called EDCO and said 'HELP ME!'" she said. "A representative came right away and worked up a proposal."
"Previous purges had not been consistent," said EDCO's Ken Karriker. "Although they were supposed to be purging 1997, there were still files as old as 1989."
Process Improvement and Purge Provide Answers
EDCO’s File Room Analysis yielded a plan that gave Lakeside space for three years' growth. He also proposed a new SmartCAR™ (computer-assisted retrieval system) and a plan for completely reorganizing the file rooms. The department now functions smoothly.
EDCO’s 4-person purge team worked 6 p.m.--7 a.m. for 12 days, and they communicated with her every step of the way, Leos recalled. Detailed labels specifying exact contents were attached to each box, and all were stored in a locked room until being loaded into a 18-wheeler. In all, EDCO microfilmed 1671 boxes of records for Lakeside.
"It was a huge project; much larger than the original budget," Moore said, explaining that EDCO's Budget Maintenance Program™ let them distribute payments into two fiscal years.
