Saturday, February 07, 2009

Hospital Hand Wash Poka Yoke

I stumbled across a cool example of a hospital poka yoke dealing with the persistent issue of lack of hand washing. At MetroWest Medical Center in Framingham, Massachusetts, Lean Process Manager Kevin Frieswick has developed a hand wash poka yoke using “Radio Shack and Home Depot parts”. They also post a great clip that shows this device in action, but you have the see the heart monitor portion before getting to the hand washing toll gate.

I salute Kevin with a clean hand for his creativity before capital!

4 comments:

Mark Graban said...

Nice. But if the guy in the video were a doctor, he'd still have germs on his tie and shirt-sleeves, quite possibly.

If he gels his hands and then leans down and touches his tie to keep it falling on the patient, then he might be dirty again (germs can live on ties and clothing).

Further prevention might include rules for MDs NOT wearing ties (or clipping them down) and/or NOT wearing long sleeves.

But I like his inventiveness!

Mike Wroblewski said...

Thanks for your insight Mark. I read about the study pointing out the high level of germs found on ties. Seems like it would be easy to eliminate the ties, so I wonder why doctors (or other health professionals) still wear ties?

Anonymous said...

Excellent stuff, Mike. The information on the registration process was also a good idea. Keep'em coming.

Unknown said...

The link is broken. Just an update on where it moved. http://www.mwmc.com/about-mwmc/in-the-news/MetroWest-Medical-Center-Boasts-Innovation.aspx