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string of small ENT cases or 4 or 5 total joints. Each one of those has a
different expected turnover time."
Ms. Merrick has assigned each team member a specific role so "you
don't have people falling all over themselves and repeating what someone else is doing."
The benefit of writing the target turnover time in each OR for all to
see? "The written time is a visual goal," says Ms. Merrick. "This is the
number you're trying to get the patient back in the room by. Right now,
everyone is competing for surgical volume. To a surgeon, efficiency and
time are money. The quicker and the more efficiently that we can get
that surgeon's cases processed through surgery safely, the faster that
we can get him back into this office to see more patients, the happier
he is and the more likely that he is to send us more business."
— Dan O'Connor
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O U T PAT I E N T S U R G E R Y M A G A Z I N E O N L I N E | N O V E M B E R 2013
