L’industrialisation des blocs opératoires: Lean Management et réification

Bound to evolve in the framework of new regulations largely inspired by the ethos of the New Public Management doctrine, hospitals are increasingly adopting Lean Management to deliver care efficiently. Recognized for its productivity gains, Lean aims to streamline production processes by eliminating all non-value creating tasks ; as such, it can be considered as a powerful way to industrialize healthcare. While the existing literature shows that the adoption of Lean in healthcare has led to some significant productivity enhancements, little has been done to examine the consequences of this new management model on medical and allied health professionals. Using a critical lens, we show in this article how Lean Management can be a powerful vector of industrialization in healthcare. Based on an in-depth case study, conducted in a French operating theatre, we propose a classification of organisational transformations generated by the adoption of Lean before highlighting how they contributed to the creation of a reifying environment for both staff and patients.