Are you looking forward to your surgery?

Abstract

Considers the current state of health‐care provision – noting that the sector is in distress. Suggests that we need to find the root cause of the problems and not just the symptoms. As an example of good practice, points to Shouldice Hospital in Toronto, Canada – a single‐service clinic doing 7,000 hernia operations per year. Notes that Shouldice has an almost nil recurrence rate – one out of 200 operations – which is close to Six Sigma. Suggests that the Shouldice story underlines the importance of obvious service quality factors such as the need to be long‐term and to work on continuously developing methods and skills.

Citation

Gummesson, E. (2001), "Are you looking forward to your surgery?", Managing Service Quality: An International Journal, Vol. 11 No. 1, pp. 7-9. https://doi.org/10.1108/09604520110366142