The Impact of Proper Surgery Planning on Operating Room Efficiency. An Italian Case Study in 2021

The study aims to investigate whether correct organizational procedures associated with correct operating room planning and scheduling led to fewer canceled patients and improved OR performance indicators. The following performance and efficiency metrics were monitored: Start Time Tardiness, Turnover Time, Overtime, Under Utilization, and Case Cancellation Rate. We conducted a retrospective case study at the Orthopedic Institute Rizzoli of Bologna, a specialized orthopedic surgery hospital. The analysis considered 674 operations performed between October and November 2021, including cases from all operating units. In order to evaluate the correct planning of operations, we divided the slots retrospectively based on correct scheduling: those with more than 50% of correctly scheduled surgeries and those that fell short of this percentage. The results of performed t-tests indicated a statistically significant difference for Turnover Time and Start Time Tardiness. For the group of operations that followed the complete organizational scheduling procedure, the t-tests showed an average reduction of 8.35 min (−19.5%, p < 0.05) for Turnover Time per single operation and 13.12 min (−17.8%, p < 0.01) shorter Start Time Tardiness. No significant differences were observed for Under Utilization, Overtime, and Case Cancelation Rate. In conclusion, we found completeness in surgical scheduling had a positive effect on operating room waste time, with reductions of over 17% in Turnover Time and Start Time Tardiness. These results highlight the importance of proper surgical programming for hospital managers and the areas with more room for improvement.