A Review and Comparison of Maturity/ Capability Frameworks for Healthcare Process Assessment and Improvement

摘要

Process assessment enables one to identify strengths and weaknesses of selected processes in a specific domain typically by referencing process maturity/capability frameworks. Assessment findings are usually transformed into action items for process improvement. In the healthcare domain where hospitals offer high-risk services to patients every day in a complex, dynamic, and multidisciplinary environment, establishing process thinking and effective process management is increasingly demanded but not an easy task to accomplish. In this study, the authors investigate the maturity/ capability frameworks that are proposed or used for assessing and improving the healthcare processes. They searched the studies reported between the years 2000 and 2015 in scientific digital libraries and identified 29 studies out of 958 initially retrieved in a systematic way. They reviewed six studies out of 29 with respect to a number of research questions and compared them against design criteria that the authors elicited from related studies in literature. The results of review and comparison indicate that: 1) there is a need for proposing and using maturity/capability frameworks as specific to healthcare; 2) the use of maturity/capability frameworks for specific contexts in healthcare might bring significant benefits; and 3) the majority of the frameworks newly proposed in healthcare settings are lacking basic, descriptive, or prescriptive design properties. The authors hope their findings will be useful in managing new developments and adaptations of maturity/capability frameworks in the healthcare domain.