Background: Geographic localization is the practice of assigning physician and advanced practice provider teams to patients located in the same inpatient unit. Poor localization of hospital medicine teams at our institution was identified as a top cause of increased Emergency Department boarding and Length Of Stay (LOS). The purpose of our process improvement project is [...]

Background: Improving efficiency and throughput in cancer patients with high acuity is challenging and requires a multi-disciplinary effort to coordinate care delivery. In The James Cancer Hospital, two separate Internal Medicine Divisions (Medical Oncology and Hospital Medicine) have historically provided inpatient oncology hospitalist care to an average daily census of 98 patients throughout The James, [...]

Background: As a strategy to improve throughput and efficiency, Vanderbilt University Hospital implemented geographic localization across several Hospital Medicine (HM) teams and units. This large-scale structural change presents an opportunity to not only improve efficiency and quality metrics, but to improve other patient-centered outcomes including patient experience. Purpose: To assess the impact of a hospital [...]

Background: As a strategy to address its ongoing capacity crisis, our hospital has focused on reducing length of stay and improving throughput. Our hospitalists care for patients on >20 nursing units across four buildings, which creates inefficiencies that may prolong length of stay. Although other institutions have demonstrated improved patient flow by geographically cohorting patients [...]

Background: Vanderbilt University Hospital continues to experience a capacity crisis, leading to a focus on strategies to improve patient flow and length of stay. Other institutions have demonstrated improved throughput by geographically cohorting patients and their respective care teams. Purpose: To reduce hospital length of stay and increase early discharges through the implementation of a [...]