Reducing unnecessary outpatient attendances.
OBJECTIVE
The purpose of this paper is to explore unnecessary outpatient department attendances and to improve efficiency by actively pre-assessing patient charts and pre-specifying management plans before scheduled outpatient visits.


METHODS
All charts were reviewed by a senior clinician two weeks before the clinic and a brief, written management plan made.


RESULTS
A significant reduction in clinic sizes by about 40 per cent can be expected. There was a non-significant increase in the ratio of new to review patients and no significant reduction in waiting lists.


CONCLUSIONS
Pre-assessing patient charts leads to cancelling unnecessary outpatient reviews, which can increase outpatient department effectiveness.


CONCLUSIONS
Clinical efficiency is becoming increasingly important. This work describes a simple strategy to improve outpatient department productivity.
Donnellan
F
F
Department of Medicine, St Luke's Hospital, Kilkenny, Ireland. fdonnellan77@hotmail.com
Hussain
T
T
Aftab
A R
AR
McGurk
C
C
D000554:Ambulatory Care Facilities / Q000458:organization & administration*; D017598:Efficiency, Organizational; D006801:Humans; D011785:Quality Assurance, Health Care / Q000458:organization & administration; D057188:Workflow