Writer

An award-winning writer for over 20 years, Naida Grunden has spent the last decade documenting Lean/Toyota improvements in the health care setting. Naida also shares an interest in applying what has been learned in aviation safety and reliability to healthcare. In addition to numerous articles, speeches and legislative testimony, Naida wrote the book, The Pittsburgh Way to Efficient Healthcare, which describes the work of the Pittsburgh Regional Health Initiative (PRHI), a small nonprofit organization, which began in 2001 to pilot Lean experiments in competing hospitals across Southwestern Pennsylvania. The effort produced some of the first genuine, on-the-ground evidence that a Toyota-based industrial model could work in health care. Naida continues to write Lean case studies for consultant clients and periodicals. She has blogged for Healthcare Performance Partners and for Mark Graban’s blog www.leanblog.org. Her recent publications include:

• Learning at the frontline: All hands on deck, Frontiers of Health Services Management, September 2009.
• A region addresses patient safety, American Journal of Infection Control, AJIC Practice Forum, (with Karen W. Feinstein, PhD and Edward I. Harrison, MBA), June 2002
• Using Real-Time Problem Solving to Eliminate Central Line Infections, Joint Commission Journal on Quality and Safety,　 September 2006
• Industrial Techniques Help Reduce Hospital-Acquired Infection, Biomedical Instrumentation and Technology, Fall 2005
  Winner, American College of Clinical Engineering Challenge Award, 2006
• Quality Through Collaboration, Testimony before the HEART subcommittee, Harrisburg, PA August 26, 2004
• Medicaid Reform Time Again, Physician’s News Digest, March 2006
• NJ tackles hospital infections, Physician’s News Digest, December 2006
• Whatcom County offers cutting-edge medical technology, Whatcom Independent, July 2007
• Whatcom Alliance for Healthcare Access Forum Report,　July 2007

Naida Grunden is available for writing assignments.
For information and pricing details, please contact her.