St. Luke's Hospital Breaks Out of the Pack to Improve Patient and Physician Satisfaction

Case Study - March 2008

Abstract: Faced with declining in-patient satisfaction scores, St. Luke’s Hospital implemented an organization-wide strategic initiative to improve performance by changing the culture. The hospital selected the Malcolm Baldrige Criteria for Performance Excellence as an improvement framework and subsequently introduced its “breaking out of the pack” strategy to accomplish the organization’s improvement goals. Utilizing lean tools along with behavioral-based initiatives, St. Luke’s saw its in-patient satisfaction scores quickly rise from the 49th percentile to above the 90th percentile, while physician satisfaction scores rose from the 81st to the 95th percentile. As a result of its performance improvement initiatives, the hospital was named a Press Ganey Success Story recipient in 2007 as well as a Silver Award winner in the Iowa Recognition for Performance Excellence program.

Keywords: Case study - Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award - Patient satisfaction - Lean - Physician satisfaction - Process management - Iowa Recognition for Performance Excellence award