A framework for improving access and customer service times in health care: application and analysis at the UCLA Medical Center.

There has been an increasing emphasis on health care efficiency and costs and on improving quality in health care settings such as hospitals or clinics. However, there has not been sufficient work on methods of improving access and customer service times in health care settings. The study develops a framework for improving access and customer service time for health care settings.

Impact and costs of targeted recruitment of minorities to the National Lung Screening Trial.

Background: To promote results in the National Lung Screening Trial (NLST) that are generalizable across the entire US population, a subset of NLST sites developed dedicated strategies for minority recruitment.

Purpose: To report the effects of targeted strategies on the accrual of underrepresented groups, to describe participant characteristics, and to estimate the costs of targeted enrollment.

Methods: The 2002-2004 Tobacco Use Supplement was used to estimate eligible proportions of racial and ethnic categories.