Delivering exceptional care at lower cost

The second Your Big Idea challenge asked faculty and staff to submit answers to the following question:  How can we (Penn Medicine) continue to deliver exceptional care, advance medical education and conduct innovative research at a lower cost without reducing quality?

More than 1,000 Penn Medicine faculty and staff submitted a total of 1,332 ideas during the challenge.

One of the goals of the 2013 Your Big Idea Challenge was to implement more ideas than the first challenge in 2012.  After the submission period concluded, an interdisciplinary review team reviewed ratings and discussed and categorized ideas for implementation.  

Categories included:

  • Quick Fix- ideas that had a clear implementation plan that could be operationalized quickly if provided support.
  • Commission-A-Team- ideas that had great potential but need to be developed further.  Teams in this category were asked to launch pilot programs to learn more about how their ideas might be operationalized and implemented at scale.
  • Performance Improvement in Action (PIIA)- Ideas that have a lot of promise, and would benefit from the Penn Medicine Academy’s PIIA program, a facilitated program that leverages continuous improvement methodologies like Lean and Six Sigma in the implementation of projects.  

Winning teams in each of the categories are outlined below. 

Category 1:  Quick Fix

Improved Efficiency of Argatroban Utilization, Todd Miano, Pharmacy Clinical Specialist, HUP
Improving the Efficiency of HIV Genotyping, Dana Byrne, Infectious Disease Fellow, HUP

Category 2:  Commission-A-Team

PPI Overuse, Kristy Reinert, Attending Physician, HUP

In Hindsight, Was This Test Needed? Saurabh Jha, Assistant Professor, HUP

Overstock of Supplies, Christine Maugle, Clinical Supervisor, CPUP

Paperless?  Let's Do This For Real, Jeff Tokazewski, Physician (Family Medicine), CCA

Paper Trail, Brandi Smith, PSR II, CCA

Category 3:  Performance Improvement in Action (PIIA)

Research Laboratory Cost Containment, Kelly Reynolds, Director of Finance and Operations, Perelman School of Medicine 

Semi-Centralized Research Administration Shared Services Model, Marianne  Achenbach, Executive Director, Perelman School of Medicine

Improve the Availability of Weekend Testing To Reduce Hospital LOS, Craig Umscheid, Assistant Professor of Medicine and Epidemiology, CPUP 

Run MRI Overnight, Yevgeniy Gitelman, Resident, HUP

Chemotherapy Vial Rounding, Tracy Krause, Hematology/Oncology Clinical Pharmacy Specialist, HUP

Optimized Test Utilization by Inpatient DRG, Robert Metheny, Robert Client Services Manager, HUP