A STUDY OF DECONGESTION OF AN OUTPATIENT DEPARTMENT IN A TERTIARY CARE HOSPITAL, INDIA

Abstract

Introduction . Outpatient Department (OPD) in any hospital is considered to be shop window of the hospital. The important role played by expectations in consumer’s evaluation of services has been widely acknowledged in the service quality literature. There are various problems faced by the patients in out patient department like over crowding, delay in consultation, lack of proper guidance etc that leads to patient dissatisfaction. W e planned a study to document the various reasons of congestion in OPD and to recommend measures to decongest the OPD. Methodology. The study was a longitudinal study consisting of both prospective observation and retrospective data collection. The OPD was observed for a period of one month and various area of overcrowding were noted down. The patients were interviewed for the problems faced. The workload of the OPD was taken from the MRD department and the manpower deployed in the registration counter. The registration counter was observed for the work done by the operator. OPD attendance were analysed using descriptive statistics and were presented as proportions. Results. It was found that the patient wanted two major things one was the help desk to guide them and the other was information to be displayed. The most sort information was the doctors name and the room number & days he sits in the OPD. The other important information was the queue number to be displayed outside the room so that they know when their number will come. It was also observed that there were multiple queues which were present in the OPD which crossed each other and added lot of chaos. One was the queue for the ECG room other was the queue for bar code generation for blood samples third was the queue for blood sampling and lastly queue for the sample deposition. It was observed that queue for sample deposition was mostly formed of the patients which were from other centers where the tests were not done. The counters for registration were place where the patients are registered for the OPD and first point of contact. In the Cardiothoracic centre the OPD load has tripled in three years and the staff deployed are only 14 which are PTSG. Conclusion & Recommendations. New System of LED display outside the consultation room showing Name of doctor, queue number (Using queue management software), patient number, any instruction/News/Education material to be displayed, enhanced manpower of the counters, may I help you desk in front of the OPD main gate, a big LED display outside the OPD, setting up of Patient Registration Counter & relocation of Lab. Keywords: India, uotpacient department, decongestion, healthcare services Normal 0 false false false EN-US X-NONE X-NONE /* Style Definitions */ table.MsoNormalTable {mso-style-name:Table Normal; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0; mso-tstyle-colband-size:0; mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-priority:99; mso-style-parent:; mso-padding-alt:0cm 5.4pt 0cm 5.4pt; mso-para-margin-top:0cm; mso-para-margin-right:0cm; mso-para-margin-bottom:8.0pt; mso-para-margin-left:0cm; line-height:107%; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:11.0pt; font-family:Calibri,sans-serif; mso-ascii-font-family:Calibri; mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-hansi-font-family:Calibri; mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family:Times New Roman; mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-bidi;}