Presentation Summary - "Lean Healthcare: What is Possible?"

Using case studies and ties to the aviation industry, Naida Grunden will describe the advances possible when Toyota-based Lean improvements are applied in health care. Efficiency, as practiced in a Lean environment, is about more than organized storage spaces. In fact, it affects every aspect of care, including patient safety and satisfaction, employee satisfaction, and clinical practice. With a mix of photos, videos, and stories from the frontline, Grunden opens the door to what is possible in healthcare with Lean.

Biography

A professional writer for over 20 years, Naida Grunden has spent the last decade documenting Lean/Toyota improvements in the health care setting. Ms. Grunden also shares an interest in applying what has been learned in aviation safety and reliability to healthcare.

In addition to writing numerous general and academic articles, Ms. Grunden wrote the book, The Pittsburgh Way to Efficient Healthcare, which describes the work of the Pittsburgh Regional Health Initiative (PRHI), a small nonprofit organization, which began in 2001 to pilot Lean experiments in competing hospitals across Southwestern Pennsylvania. The effort produced some of the first genuine, on-the-ground evidence that a Toyota-based industrial model could work in health care.

As more hospitals in the U.S. and abroad begin to embrace the principles of “doing more with less,” Grunden continues to teach, speak, and write nationally and internationally on the topic of Lean/Toyota in health care.

Ms. Grunden holds a BA in English from California State University, East Bay and a secondary English teaching credential from California State University, San Francisco.