Application of PDCA Cycle in Shortening Patients' Waiting Time for Drugs

OBJECTIVE To introduce PDCA cycle as a theory and method to reduce patients’ waiting time for getting drugs from outpatient pharmacy, enhance the quality of Jiangxi pharmaceutical care and improve patients’ satisfaction. METHODS According to the PDCA cycle, existing problems of Jiangxi Provincial People’s Hospital were found in dispensing from January to May 2019, and the causes were analyzed. Then, formulated preventive measures, and evaluated the implementation effect. RESULTS Average waiting time for getting drugs decreased from 6 min to 2.65 min with the rate of goal achievement of 55.83%. CONCLUSION The development of PDCA cycle can effectively reduce the problems in the work, optimize the dispensing process, reduce waiting time, improve work efficiency, improve service attitude, reduce the error rate of prescription dispensing, make the daily dispensing work more accurate and efficient, and improve patient satisfaction.