The effect of handover location on trauma theatre start time: An estimated cost saving of £131 000 per year

Sam Nahas, Adam Ali, Kiran Majid, Roshan Joseph, Chris Huber and Victor Babu

International Journal of Health Planning and Management, 2018, vol. 33, issue 3, 746-753

Abstract: Background The National Health Service was estimated to be in £2.45 billion deficit in 2015 to 2016. Trauma theatre utilization and efficiency has never been so important as it is estimated to cost £15/minute. Methods Structured questionnaires were given to 23 members of staff at our Trust who are actively involved in the organization or delivery of orthopaedic trauma lists at least once per week. This was used to identify key factors that may improve theatre efficiency. Following focus group evaluation, the location of the preoperative theatre meeting was changed, with all staff involved being required to attend this. Our primary outcome measure was mean theatre start time (time of arrival in the anaesthetic room) during the 1 month immediately preceding the change and the month following the change. Results Theatre start time was improved on average 24 minutes (1 month premeeting and postmeeting change). This equates to a saving of £360 per day, or £131 040 per year. Conclusion Changing the trauma meeting location to a venue adjacent to the trauma theatre can improve theatre start times, theatre efficiency, and therefore result in significant cost savings.

Date: 2018
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://doi.org/10.1002/hpm.2494

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:bla:ijhplm:v:33:y:2018:i:3:p:746-753

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.blackwell ... bs.asp?ref=0749-6753

Access Statistics for this article

International Journal of Health Planning and Management is currently edited by Calum Paton

More articles in International Journal of Health Planning and Management from Wiley Blackwell
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Wiley Content Delivery ().