Understanding Case Volume
Case Volume (aka Surgical volume) is a core hospital productivity metric. Hospital administration and OR leaders often utilize ‘volume metrics’ in conjunction with other metrics to help understand and manage the throughput of their OR’s.
Using case volume to run your business
Case Volume is an industry standard metric that helps hospitals understand the quantity of cases performed in the OR. On its own, Case Volume gives an overview of how many cases are performed over time.
When filtered by common parameters (such as room name, time of day, or surgeon), teams can better understand where the majority of its services are put to use. These utilization insights can lead to opportunities for investment, resource allocation strategies, and revenue savings.
Definitions
Start time (Actual): The actual time a patient is wheeled into the operating room, as determined by Apella’s advanced computer vision “wheels in” algorithm.
End time (Actual): The actual time a patient is wheeled out of the operating room, as determined by Apella’s advanced computer vision “wheels out” algorithm.
Calculating case volume
A Case begins when a patient is wheeled in, and ends when the patient is wheeled out.
Case Volume (aka Total Cases) is a simple count of cases performed in the operating room on a given date or date range.*
StartTimeActual(when the patient is wheeled into the room). Use the filters available on the Apella Dashboard to review case volume for specific dates, rooms, surgeons, or other parameters.
Filtering and exporting
Real time access: Do you know what data you are looking for but don’t want to wait for an EPIC/Cerner report? Use the Download button available on the Insights dashboard to download your list of cases to a .csv. Use Excel to explore your data to find quick answers to questions faster than waiting for next months OREC data.
Bespoke data: Perhaps the data you need is close to but not quite what is represented in the Insights dashboard, “Ask Apella” for additional insight into your data.
FAQ
Sometimes cases happen in our OR's that are on my department's responsibility. Can I exclude them from the metrics?
While we cannot exclude them from showing up at all for the sight, you can use the filters to out certain rooms, surgeons or procedures. If that doesn’t work for your situation, you can utilize the .csv download function to exclude certain items.
The dashboard doesn't show a surgeon or procedure, what is happening?
Sometimes there can be issues in the integration between the EHR data and Apella data. This can happen because a case is added or deleted using a non-standard workflow. In most cases, this should be rare and we have determined that the Apella computer vision is likely to be correct in this scenario.
Can’t find what you need?
For more information, contact your Customer Success Manager.