If Disney Ran Your Hospital, with a twist

So, I was watching the discovery HD channel the other day and they had an hour long show dedicated to all things Disney. I know of the book If Disney Ran Your Hospital: 9 1/2 Things You Would Do Differently (Paperback)by Fred Lee (Author), and thought i would do a new take on it.

So lets start at the beginning, we will use Disneyland in California for the visuals in your head! If you have never been there... check this out! DISNEY

We will omit the tram ride from the parking lot, although a magical train shaped security car patrolling the parking lots does seem like a good mood changer. From the moment you buy your ticket and walk through the gates music is playing, visuals cue you to "lands" to explore and visit. Now of course a hospital is not a fun place to be, but what is the feeling we get when we go into the hospital. Signs in multiple languages, cold white walls, a crowded waiting room.

Now lets take a spin at a Disney version of this scene. Imagine you walk into the hospital with warm and inviting colors. Ok, I admit the signs in 3 of the nations most popular languages is a Disney feature, think "Its a Small World", but the crowded waiting room could change. Disney is amazing a crowd control.

Have you ever walked up to Splash Mountain, you can only see a fraction of the actual 200 people in the line, and they have a wait time indicator. For some reasons hospitals are against that.

Now, I am an ED nurse, and I understand the patient acuity scores and the sicker you are the faster you come back, but the majority of today's ED patients are acute care patients. That is, they have colds, aches, minor injuries, or non-critical illness.

Disney creates the illusion that wait is shorter, you go through phases of the line. You start outside, then you get into the inner-sanctum. Here you have visual stimuli that distract you from the actual wait. Then you get a glimpse of where you are supposed to be, the actual ride, and then you are there. ED triage flow could reduce patient anxiety and frustration with waits if the adopted a similar design.

Another thought would be to institute the fast-pass. A non-critical patient could be triaged by an advanced practitioner and given a pass to come back at a pre-determined time for a 20 minute wait or less. Talk about decompressing the lobby quickly.

Disney is also very good at innovation. In the show one of the Imagineers discussed how the monorail was developed. Basically, Walt went to the worlds fair, saw a prototype, came back with a few drawings, said he wanted it, and the group built it.

How can healthcare follow this model, well as most of us aware, innovation in healthcare administration and management is poor at best. Having a team of Imagineers that dedicated to innovating solutions for the hospital problems sounds like a good revenue source. The monorail is the highest visited attraction in the park, think of the possibilities of a team dedicated to creating change in the healthcare environment.

We can call them Master Change Facilitators or Health-o-vationeers. Sorry that was a bit over the top.

So I know this blog is a bit longer then a scanner blog master reader would like, so I will make this an installment blog. BUT, lets do one more.

Sorry, can't help it, but Disney is great at immersing the patrons into the experience of Disney. Guests can imagine to be a princess, an elephant, part of the Seven Dwarfs, or a member of the Pirates crew.

So what does that have to do with healthcare. Well, those that know me know my passion for Human Patient Simulation. Implementing the immersive properties of Disney into a realistic patient simulation aimed at developing practitioner skills would improve patient safety, better inter-staff communication, increase knowledge retention, and allow for prototyping new care models. At least that is what the research is suggesting.

So I will continue this series at another time, but imagine a Disney hospital... Patient centered, clean, innovative, and geared to make the horrible experience of a hospital stay, a little more magical!