CHAPTER $6/$ ALLOCATING RESOURCES TO THE PROJECT

Friendly Assisted Living Facility

Resource Usage$-6$

The team for the Assisted Living Facility $($ALF$)$ program

was working to prepare in$-$depth plans, complete with the

resource requirements for their projects' tasks.

Marc Alison, MD$,$ the Medical Director of

Rehabilitation Services for Friendly Medical Center was

responsible for developing a project plan with the objec$-$

tive of identifying the scope and associated costs of health

services to offer residents. The Medical Director included

in the plan the development of an assessment tool that

would be used to determine the required level and cost of

care for prospective residents. This tool would also be

used to ensure that the appropriate population was housed

at the facility. It was important to have a way to distin$-$

guish a person who was too sick and needed a more

intense level of care than that offered by the Assisted

Living Facility. Once the assessment of a potential resi$-$

dent was completed, the facility staff could determine if

the person assessed was a good candidate for the facility.

This phase of the project plan was critical to the success

of the project.

Dr$.$ Alison's approach was to develop the assessment

tool and test it on individuals that matched the marketing

department's target population of the assisted living facil$-$

ity. He felt he had a great opportunity to find his test popu$-$

lation by using some of the current Friendly Medical

Center patients who were almost ready for discharge from

the hospital. He could also use some of the older volun$-$

teers who currently worked at the hospital. Dr$.$ Alison felt

strongly that a physician should assess potential residents

but he also knew that it might be cost prohibitive to have

such an expensive resource conducting pre$-$admission

assessments. He thought that if a physician developed and

tested the tool first, then additional testing could be con$-$

ducted using less costly health care professionals to con$-$

duct the evaluations.

Dr$.$ Alison knew he would have to work with Dr$.$ Zen

Link, Head of Geriatric Medicine, on developing the tool.

Dr$.$ Link was familiar with the elderly population that the

marketers were targeting and could offer valuable insights

on how to assess the health status of potential residents.

Dr$.$ Link also had an extensive practice at Friendly Medical

Center and would have some patients who might agree to

help test the assessment tool. Dr$.$ Alison would also need

the services of the CFO and his staff to determine the cost

of the health services the residents would need. Dr$.$ Alison

prepared and presented the following plan to the project

steering team:

$$CHAPTER $6/$ ALLOCATING RESOURCES TO THE PROJECT

$\backslash$table$[[$ID$,$Task Name,Duration,Predecessors,Resource Names$],[1,$Medical$/$Health services determined,$48\mathrm{.}25$ days,,$],[2,$Physical health assessment tool for residents developed,$25\mathrm{.}75$ days,,Alison, Link$],[3,$Develop tool,$2$ wks$,,$Alison, Link$],[4,$Test of assessment tool conducted by physicians $(12$ patients$),6$ hrs$,3,$Alison, Link$],[5,$Revise tool as necessary,$1$ wk$,4,],[6,\backslash$table$[[$Test of tool conducted by other health professionals $($i$.$e$.,],[$phys$.$ asst, RN$,$ therapist$)]],2$ wks$,5,],[7,$Admission & discharge criteria finalized,$1\mathrm{.}5$ wks$,6,$Alison, Splient$],[8,$Investigate copyrighting assessment tool,$3$ wks$,4,$Legal$],[9,$Assessment tool finalized,$0$ days,$7,],[10,$Copyright tool,$0$ days,$8,9,],[11,$Financial impact of health services determined,$15$ days,,$],[12,$Costs determined,$1$ wk$,9,$Alison, CFO$],[13,$Scope of health services determined to include in base rate,$2$ wks$,12,$Proj. Steering Team$],[14,$Scope of services to provide on a fee for service basis,$2$ wks$,12,$Proj. Steering Team$],[15,$Finalize services and programs to be offered,$0$ days,$13,14,]]$

The ALF team was impressed with the thought that went into Dr$.$ Alison's project plan. They were delighted with the prospect of copyrighting an admission and discharge assessment tool, but they raised some questions about Dr$.$ Alison's resource assignments. The $($C$)/($O$)$O asked how Drs$.$ Alison and Link were going to assess a sufficient sample of people in $6$ hours' time given their busy clinical schedules. Dr$.$ Alison replied that he and Dr$.$ Link would be doing all of the other steps in the plan during their normal$8$ to $5$pM workday. The step to test the tool on real patients, however, would take some scheduling. Dr$.$ Alison added that his colleague intended to conduct evaluations of current patients, with their permission, during their regular office visits. Dr$.$ Alison admitted he had not figured out how he was going to see his share of the test group. He knew he could see some inpatients ready for discharge from the hospital during the time he did his rounds. He also wanted to test the tool on at least a dozen people from

the volunteer staff who matched the prospective resident population. He informed the team that his secretary had agreed to phone the volunteers and see if any of them were interested. She said she could do this during her norma