Lean implementation approaches at different levels in Swedish hospitals: the importance for working conditions, worker engagemen

This paper reports result from one-year follow up in a research program with the overall aim to investigate how implementations of lean in health care affect working conditions, health, and performance of employees at five Swedish hospitals. This paper summarizes the implementation approaches, and their importance at short-term follow up for performance (with regard to active work with improvements), perceived working conditions and stress-related health among the healthcare workers. The implementation strategies and pace varied between the hospitals and between the strategic and operative levels. This short-term follow up showed that physical stress-related symptoms had increased overall but the cognitive stress had increased only in hospitals implementing lean. In hospitals with high implementation pace, there were more improvement work among the employees, but higher quantitative demands and lower job satisfaction.