Healthcare innovation: An examination of process improvement

The term healthcare innovation has been floating around different healthcare systems for quite some time, but it is becoming more and more common for healthcare systems to place an emphasis on innovation in their company. There are many forms of healthcare innovation, three forms of innovation will be discussed in this paper: technology innovation, financial innovation, and process innovation. The majority of the paper is focused on process innovation and the different ways to approach process innovation. There are two major approaches to process innovation, systematic and design thinking. A systematic approach follows and orderly process with clearly defined goals and objectives, where the end solution is often seen from the very beginning of the project. The second approach is design thinking. The key to design thinking is being able to take on another's point of view and work on the project from that stance, the key is empathy. Design thinking also differs from a systematic approach, as design thinking places a large emphasis on iterations of the solution, to allow for the best possible solution. It is up to the individual hospital system to decide with process innovation approach they will choose. Intermountain Healthcare and the University of Utah are two notable organizations who apply the principles of a systematic approach. A design thinking approach is used by the Mayo Clinic and two University of Utah think tanks. Healthcare innovation is allowing an industry that has been using antiquated business processes to be brought into the 21st century.