Review on the use of Control charts in Healthcare/Medicine with special attention to joint location-scale monitoring.

Abstract

The use of control charts for process control and analytics in health care is not as common as in industrial processes due to variations in inputs (patients). The potential of these charts are yet to be fully unveiled in the health sector. This thesis will look into the various applications of control charts in the health sector. The review will be divided into three sections; general review, review on attribute control charts and review on variable control charts application in healthcare. The type of Control chart used is also a decisive factor to be considered based on the data at hand. The main objective of health care practitioners is to save lives therefore they are supposed to be equipped with all the information about a particular situation and an easier way to do so is by using control charts. Control charts will make it easier for them to visualize this information in form of charts so that they can do their jobs effectively but this SPC technique is still to be accepted by some health care institutions and practitioners who see this as a waste of time or resources. This work will also detailly look at basic types of attribute and variable control charts applied to the health sector. The last part of this work will be a review focused on non parametric charts for joint location and scale monitoring followed by a discussion on possible applications in the health sector.