Surgeries are extremely expensive (exceeding a hundred thousand dollars for a spinal fusion, for instance), and most surgeons have little knowledge of their OR costs. We hypothesize that we can lower surgical costs by creating a price transparency initiative. When presented with cost data, surgeons may choose cheaper alternatives, and may choose to forgo expensive tests with very low yields. For instance, a neurosurgeon may choose a cheaper craniotomy plating set, or may decide to forgo a post-operative CT scan in a neurologically intact patient, when presented with the “bill”.

Costs of the use of an operating room are significant, with each minute of a routine operating room estimated to cost $69. Thus, the costs of unused operating room time can add up to a significant cost. Every day, the operating rooms are scheduled to start at 7:30 AM. To get the patient ready to be in the operating room at this time takes a concerted effort by the nurse in the operating room and in the preoperative area, the anesthesia team, the surgeons, and the OR staff.

this applies to sfgh. Currently the emergency room has it's own electronic medical record system that is independent of InVision. Can improve patient care by allowing providers outside of er to view the system. Patients in er and clinical decision unit have vitals tracked within that system, also nurses notes, and medications given are all tracked in the system. Though the data does eventually get loaded into invision, there are sometimes delays in the uploading and can improve patient care as well as speed of admitting by allowing others to view the system. 

As a UCSF staff member, I've had trouble accessing our doctors, clinics, even our Benefits Office by phone.  If we can't navigate the system, who can? 

Does your phone message send people on an endless loop, or direct them to a dark hole?  Do callers have nowhere to go to leave a message at the end of a string of options, or just end up back where they started?  Are they directed to leave a message under a specific doctor's name when they may not yet even HAVE a doctor?  When is the last time staff listened to their own phone messages and made sure they were "user friendly?"