title: Application of kaizen methodology to foster departmental engagement in quality improvement.
abstract: The Toyota Production System, also known as Lean, is a structured approach to continuous quality improvement that has been developed over the past 50 years to transform the automotive manufacturing process. In recent years, these techniques have been successfully applied to quality and safety improvement in the medical field. One of these techniques is kaizen, which is the Japanese word for "good change." The central tenant of kaizen is the quick analysis of the small, manageable components of a problem and the rapid implementation of a solution with ongoing, real-time reassessment. Kaizen adds an additional "human element" that all stakeholders, not just management, must be involved in such change. Because of the small size of the changes involved in a kaizen event and the inherent focus on human factors and change management, a kaizen event can serve as good introduction to continuous quality improvement for a radiology department.
authors.affiliation: Department of Radiology, Medical College of Wisconsin, Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Electronic address: pknechtges@mcw.edu.
authors.forename: Paul
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Knechtges
authors.affiliation: Department of Emergency Medicine, Medical College of Wisconsin, Milwaukee, Wisconsin.
authors.forename: Michael Christopher
authors.initials: MC
authors.lastname: Decker
mesh_terms: D017146:Models, Organizational; D009042:Motivation; D015279:Organizational Culture; D017410:Practice Guidelines as Topic; D058996:Quality Improvement / Q000458:organization & administration*; D011871:Radiology / Q000458:organization & administration*; D011872:Radiology Department, Hospital / Q000458:organization & administration*; D017749:Total Quality Management / Q000458:organization & administration*; D014481:United States
keywords: Lean; change management; continuous quality improvement; kaizen; practice quality management