Staff perception of Lean, care-giving, thriving and exhaustion: a longitudinal study in primary care

BACKGROUND: Lean is commonly adopted in healthcare to increase quality of care and efficiency. Few studies of Lean involve staff-related outcomes, and few have a longitudinal design. Thus, the aim was to examine the extent to which changes over time in Lean maturity are associated with changes over time in care-giving, thriving and exhaustion, as perceived by staff, with a particular emphasis on the extent to which job demands and job resources, as perceived by staff, have a moderated mediation effect. METHOD: A longitudinal study with a correlational design was used. In total, 260 staff at 46 primary care units responded to a web survey in 2015 and 2016. All variables in the study were measured using staff ratings. Ratings of Lean maturity reflect participants’ judgements regarding the entire unit; ratings of care-giving, thriving, exhaustion and job demands and resources reflect participants’ judgements regarding their own situation. RESULTS: First, over time, increased Lean maturity was associated with increased staff satisfaction with their care-giving and increased thriving, mediated by increased job resources. Second, over time, increased Lean maturity was associated with decreased staff exhaustion, mediated by decreased job demands. No evidence was found showing that job demands and job resources had a moderated mediation effect. CONCLUSION: The results indicate that primary care staff may benefit from working in organizations characterized by high levels of Lean maturity and that caregiving may also be improved as perceived by staff. ELECTRONIC SUPPLEMENTARY MATERIAL: The online version of this article (10.1186/s12913-019-4502-6) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.