Detroit News Hails the Lean and Process Improvement Successes of the Clinical Laboratory at Henry Ford Health System
Both the clinical laboratory and the pathology laboratory have cut TAT and error rates
It is perfect irony that the Department of Pathology and Clinical Laboratory Medicine at the Henry Ford Health System is among the most effective Lean practitioners in the world of medical laboratory testing. That’s because Lean techniques were developed by Toyota Motor Corporation, which itself based its Lean management methods on its study of Henry Ford’s groundbreaking innovations at his auto manufacturing plant in Detroit.
Thus, the current use of Lean methods at the clinical laboratory at Henry Ford Health System means that these management tools have come full circle. Today, the laboratory at the hospital in Detroit that bears Ford’s name has adopted methods used in auto manufacturing to improve the lab’s processes.
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