Key Takeaways
- Average hospital stay, an operational healthcare KPI, measures the time spent by a patient at the healthcare facility. This is a general metric and can vary as per the type of stay.
- Treatment costs, a financial healthcare KPI, tracks the impact of treatment costs on the finances, contribution margin made, and the capacity of a hospital to sustain itself.
- The operating cash flow KPI measures the amount of cash generated by organizations’ normal operations. This doesn’t comprise revenue generated from investments, expenses, and long-term expenditures as it focuses on only core operations.
- Canceled/missed appointment KPI is important for outpatient clinics and hospitals as it directly affects the efficiency of healthcare providers. If any patient doesn’t arrive for the scheduled appointment, then it results in a waste of resources and harms relations with the physician.
- Patient mortality rate KPI determines the ability of the healthcare facility and staff at stabilizing a patient who is in a critical state.
As per an article, healthcare KPIs (Key Performance Indicators) are well-defined performance measures or metrics with which one can observe, optimize, analyze, and transform healthcare facility services.
KPIs compare the performance of facilities with one another and find areas of improvement. Major aspects of KPI include storage, collection, synthesizing, and cleaning. Healthcare KPIs fall into numerous categories, which are listed out below.
30 Important Healthcare KPIs
Operational KPI
1. Average Hospital Stay
This healthcare KPI measures the time spent by a patient at the healthcare facility. This is a general metric and can vary as per the type of stay, for instance, a heart patient’s average hospital stay will be longer as compared to a patient with flu.
Average hospital stay is broken down into several categories: procedures, duration of stay, and operations. This gives an accurate result. It can be measured as per different departments of a hospital. Average hospital stay = Total stay duration/Total number of days.
2. Bed Occupancy Rate
This is an essential element of analytics and it indicates how many beds were occupied during a timespan. It is represented in percentage. Higher occupancies indicate various aspects such as the pandemic, natural calamity, or a roadside accident.
The hospital aims to keep the bed occupancy rate under control, otherwise, it imposes pressure on the hospital staff and gives rise to infection as well. So, monitor the bed occupancy rate to maintain a healthy balance between the usage of hospital resources and the pressure of the medical staff. Bed occupancy rate = Number of discharges (including deaths)/Number of beds.
3. Average Patient Wait Time
Patient wait time is the time taken by a patient from when they register to when they see a doctor for treatment. It is recommended to measure it for the ER departments, to scrutinize how prompt a hospital is in delivering urgent services to patients.
This healthcare KPI is linked to the patient satisfaction metric as no one wants to wait for a longer duration at a hospital. It helps to identify trends and rush hours for a longer timeframe. Hospitals can adjust their staff according to the demand and rush hours. A patient waits time = Total wait time/ Number of patients.
4. Medical Equipment Utilization
The increase in medical technologies has created multiple treatment options for patients, thus enhancing the availability of medical equipment at hospitals and clinics.
A high number of medical equipment at facilities results in an increase in maintenance costs, low-quality care, and poor purchasing decisions. Hence, medical equipment utilization KPI holds value for better asset management. It ensures that equipment is used for optimal needs.
Financial KPI
5. Treatment Costs
This healthcare KPI tracks the impact of treatment costs on the finances, contribution margin made, and the capacity of a hospital to sustain itself. The aim is not to reduce it to make profits but to detect exaggerated or abnormal expenses and address them.
Cost is broken down into categories such as per unit, per operation, or age group. By acknowledging these costs, you can budget better and put money in the right category. Average treatment charge = Total treatment charges/Number of treatments
6. Patient Drug Cost Per Stay
Access to patients’ drugs and their costs helps in better hospital management. If healthcare facilities aren’t able to provide the required medications, patients are likely to suffer, and hospitals will face budget pressure, and consequently staff shortages due to budget cutouts.
This healthcare KPI needs special attention and monitoring. Consider evaluating average drug cost per stay at the departmental level to effectively allocate monetary resources. Patient drug cost per stay = Total drug cost/Number of stays
7. Insurance Claim Processing Time
This KPI analyzes the time needed for processing healthcare insurance claims. Insurers are likely to take a varying amount of time in issuing payments, depending on their company policies. Hence, it’s essential to track cash flow and accounts receivable (AR) management. Moreover, facilities can make use of health insurance application to speed up the claim process.
8. Average Cost Per Discharge
This financial KPI helps hospitals and clinics in understanding which care services are overspent. It also tells which sections provide the maximum revenue. Tracking this metric helps hospitals understand long-term spending and adjust care provisions accordingly. Average cost per discharge = Total cost of discharge/Number of discharges
9. Claims Denial Rate
Healthcare expenses are paid by the insurance providers. However, there are situations where insurers see reasons not to pay. Ideally, the claims denial rate flow is below 5 percent.
A low claims denial rate indicates that the organization has more time to focus on patient care and less on paperwork. Claims denial rate (%) = (Number of denied claims/Total number of claims) * 100
10. Operating Cash Flow
The operating cash flow KPI measures the amount of cash generated by organizations’ normal operations. This doesn’t comprise revenue generated from investments, expenses, and long-term expenditures as it focuses on only core operations. This is a crucial healthcare KPI to track whether a company can create enough cash to sustain its current functions and growth.
The operating cash flow is measured as positive or negative. In this case, negative cash flow indicates that the organization needs to find a temporary source of funding to pay staff and buy medical equipment. Operating cash flow = EBIT (Earnings Before Interest and Taxes) + Depreciation – Taxes – Change in working capital
11. Net Profit Margin
This highlights the total money possessed by a healthcare facility after subtracting all expenses from the total revenue. Just like operating cash flow, the net profit margin is also measured as positive or negative.
It’s essential to maintain a positive number as a negative one indicates that the facility spent more money than it could. Net profit margin = Net income/Net sales
12. AR Turnover
Healthcare facilities receive payments from the insurance company, patients, and via government contracts. AR (Accounts Receivable) turnover is used by the management team to determine how effectively the care facility is gathering receivables.
A high AR turnover means payments are collected on time, whereas a low AR turnover indicated collection problems. AR turnover = Net credit sales/Average AR
13. Permanent Employee Wages
Human resources take up a huge chunk of the finances, hence it’s vital to keep a track of it. Employee wages are an expense to healthcare facilities, but it also comes with benefits.
Working towards decreasing this figure can result in decreasing the benefits offered by it. Hence, before creating KPI for employee wages, consider analyzing its impact on the care facility.
14. Costs Per Request
Cost per request calculates the average price for every call or chat managed by a client service representative or a chatbot. It offers insights into operational efficiency and affects revenue in the long run.
It determines whether patient services function cost-effectively and uses their resources adequately. To minimize cost per request, AI-driven chatbots are used to a certain extent before a human takes over.
Healthcare KPI for Internal Processes
15. Treatment Error Rate
This healthcare KPI measures the number of mistakes made by medical staff while providing treatment. Common errors considered while calculating treatment error rate are wrong dosage and medication, incorrect diagnosis, and providing wrong treatment. It’s essential to monitor this KPI as it directly impacts patient satisfaction rate.
Also, a high treatment error can result in an increase in costs due to readmissions. Treatment error rate (%) = (Number of treatment errors/total treatment) * 100
16. Canceled/Missed Appointments
This KPI is important for outpatient clinics and hospitals as it directly affects the efficiency of healthcare providers. If any patient doesn’t arrive for the scheduled appointment, then it results in a waste of resources and harms relations with the physician.
Canceled appointments affect the hospital’s performance, however, if appointments are canceled in advance, then staff can fill the gaps with other patients. Missed or canceled appointments are influenced by aspects such as busy schedules, transportation issues, forgetfulness, and more. Cancelation rate (%) = (Number of missed appointments/Total number of appointments) * 100
17. Training Per Department
There are times when providers lack the knowledge to diagnose a condition or they may even mistake one disease for another. Hence, to avoid such scenarios, it’s vital to set up training for every department in the hospitals. This is to assure that patients receive proper care and treatment. Healthcare facilities can track the amount of training received by each department.
18. Hospital Readmission Rates
Hospital readmission rate offers data on the number of patients who returned to the hospital within a short period after being discharged. It is one of the important healthcare metrics as far as hospital resources and care are concerned.
More readmissions mean an increase in care costs. It also sheds light on the management process such as staff neglecting details, lack of material, and treatment. Readmission rate (%) = (Number of readmissions/number of discharges) * 100
19. Patient Safety
Patient safety measures the ability of a facility to deliver top-class care to patients and keep them safe from contracting more infections, sepsis, or post-operation complications. It’s important to track this KPI to know where the problems arise, which stages can be improved, and detect any infection that’s present in a healthcare facility.
This healthcare KPI can be measured and broken down into post-operation infections, diseases, or respiratory infections. This can give a more accurate view of patient safety.
20. Partnerships with Advocacy Groups
This metric is utilized to calculate the number of partnerships a hospital holds with other organizations. The bigger the value the greater the influence a hospital gets from its campaigns and events.
Care Quality Healthcare KPI
21. Staff-to-Patient Ratio
The staff-to-patient ratio determines whether a facility’s staff management process is effective and whether a hospital is under or over-staffed. Medical providers should be available to provide care to all patients, no matter what time it is.
The aim is to offer optimal treatment and assure that every patient is taken care of. Staff-to-patient ratio = Number of staff: Number of patients
22. Patient Satisfaction
This healthcare KPI helps to improve care services based on the feedback received by the patients. Staff can ask for feedback from patients regarding their stay, meals, care quality, response time, and behavior.
This assessment points out areas of improvement and augments care standards. Also, patients will be thrilled that their opinions are taken into consideration.
23. Patient Follow-up Rate
The patient follow-up rate deals with the patient care post-discharge or treatment plan. Follow-ups are taken to ensure whether the patient is cured of his/her ailment, and if not, then tests and diagnosis are carried out once again.
Patient follow-up monitors the progress and the kind of care provided by physicians. Patient follow-up rate (%) = (Number of follow-ups/Total number of patients) * 100
24. Patient Room Turnover Rate
When a patient leaves a hospital room, tasks such as cleaning, checking equipment, prepping the room for another patient, and changing materials fall under the patient turnover rate. The aim is to ensure speedy, yet quality clean-up.
This is essential as low quality can cause infections and impact costs as well. To improve the turnover rate, establish a capable cleaning service, in-house or external.
Emergency Department KPI
25. Patient Mortality Rate
This healthcare KPI tracks the number of people who died while in the hospital. This KPI determines the ability of the healthcare facility and staff at stabilizing a patient who is in a critical state. As per the CDC, the average mortality rate in hospitals is 2 percent.
One of the effective ways to measure this KPI is to divide it into categories such as complicated diseases, old patients, cancer, etc. Patient mortality rate (%) = (Number of patients deaths/Total number of patients) * 100
26. Time Between Symptom Onset and Hospitalization
A majority of people aren’t aware of when they should seek treatment or tend to delay their diagnosis. This KPI measures the time between when a patient experiences symptoms and when they’re hospitalized.
Getting patients to the hospital as soon as possible is anytime better. It helps to detect and treat their conditions before it reaches crucial stages.
27. ER Wait Time
Emergency room (ER) wait time determines the period between the arrival of a patient in the ER and the time when he/she visits the physician. This KPI is used to evaluate the rush hours of the day and the busiest days of the week.
Targets can be set as per these records. It sheds light on issues such as the check-in process, staff overload, ER facilities, etc. Emergency room wait time = total wait time/Number of patients
Public Healthcare KPI
28. Number of Educational Programs
The public healthcare KPI tracks the number of education programs in every region. Since this is a very broad metric, it can be broken down into program types for the patients.
29. Childhood Immunization Rate
This healthcare KPI measures the number of children who have received immunizations. This can be used to determine herd immunity. It reduces stress on care centers and frees up resources to diagnose other illnesses.
Childhood immunization rate (%) = (Number of children immunized/Total number of children) * 100
30. Number of Preterm Births
According to the WHO, an estimated 15 million babies are born early every year. That’s more than 1 in 10 babies, and around 1 million children die each year due to complications of preterm birth. This KPI calculates preterm births that occurred in the region.
Healthcare KPIs play a crucial role in enhancing healthcare services, hence it’s a necessary aspect for all healthcare organizations. Arkenea is a leading healthcare software development company with over 12 years of experience. We offer a range of services starting from healthcare software modernization, third-party integrations, healthcare consulting, and much more. Get in touch with Arkenea to get cutting-edge software developed for your facility.