Clinic Management and Efficiency

Given the changing health care arena and the importance of providing services “better, faster and cheaper” health care providers need to focus more than ever before on efficient services and effective management.

We define clinic efficiency as improved or increased services or products that result in improved best practices, cost reduction and time saved, and higher client satisfaction. Improving clinic efficiency requires staff time to plan, implement changes, and evaluate efforts.

Our approach is embodied in the Institute for Health Care Improvement's Model for Improvement that provides a framework to accelerate change. We begin with three questions:

• What are we trying to accomplish?
• How will we know that a change is an improvement?
• What changes can we make that will result in improvement?

Effective clinic management relates closely to efficiency. Our work in this area reflects our belief in managers' abilities to help their staff grow to their greatest potential through:

• Ongoing feedback
• Involvement in decision making and change management
• Focusing on strengths

Examples of our work in clinic management:

• Learning Groups
• Client Satisfaction Made Easy
• Do Ask, Do Tell: A Sexuality Training for Reproductive Health Care Staff—2009
• Client-centered Care Organizational Assessment: How well does your agency provide client-centered services?
• Webinar: HIV Testing in California Medical Settings: Practical Steps for Implementing the New Testing Law and CDC Recommendations

Examples of our work in clinic efficiency:

• Title X Regional Training Center Clinic Efficiency Compendium
• Resource Manual: Improving Clinic Efficiency
• Webinar: Basic Tenets of Clinic Efficiency