Performance Improvement Initiative

New York City Health and Hospital Corporation (HHC), the largest municipal hospital system in the United States, is comprised of eleven acute care hospitals, five long term care facilities, six diagnostic and treatment centers, and more than fifty satellite clinics. To help meet the challenges of managed care and competition, HHC has made customer service and the development of a patient-friendly environment a priority. In the Fall of 1999, the President announced plans to develop a Customer Service Initiative (CSI) and developed an exploratory committee comprised of four teams. One of the teams, The Systems and Processes Team, determined that HHC should target ambulatory care to be the first area in which to begin its re-engineering and cultural change efforts. The Capstone team provided staff support in the development of a survey tool used to identify and document best practices in patient/customer service at ambulatory care networks in the HHC system. The Capstone team developed quantitative performance standards for operations and customer relations. As a result of this research, the Capstone team recommended areas to develop CQI teams to improve performance and functioning.