Clinical engineering productivity improvement.

The recent focus on productivity in hospitals due to DRGs, shorter length of patient stays, and lower census has impacted clinical engineering departments. To have an effective and productive clinical engineering program, several organizational and personnel factors should be considered. By integrating these factors with other technical factors, productivity will eventually be improved. Productivity programs, such as Quality Circles, task changes, and shop automation, can have a significant impact on improving productivity. In addition, continued measurement of the effectiveness of the overall clinical engineering department is necessary to determine the effectiveness of productivity improvement programs.