Shouldice Hospital Case Study

Memorandum

To: Russell Lacey

From: Julio Touma

Date: September 8, 2010

Rec: Shouldice Hospital Limited

Summary

Shouldice Hospital is a hospital and clinic located in the suburb in the Toronto area in Canada. This is a very unique health facility because it only deals with abdominal hernias operations. Dr. Earle Shouldice, the founder of the hospital, developed a unique technique to operate these external hernias that mainly deals with the fact that the operations are not preformed with full anesthesia. In order that, a few hours after the end of the procedure the patients are force to move freely and exercise.

At Shouldice Hospital is all about the experience the patients have. It is a very methodical and organized process that the patients, the doctors, the nurses and the administrative staff at the hospital enjoy very much. Just like any other organization, at Shouldice Hospital is all about the relationship between the customers and their employees. They take very seriously the fact that both parties have to be satisfied in order for the hospital to work properly. That is why they keep a very simple organizational chart and also that is why they give their employees the most benefits as possible.

Problems and Opportunities for Shouldice Hospital

Due to the fact that, Shouldice Hospital keeps their patients so satisfied and also their prices are so convenient compared to other institutions that provided the same service that their market only keeps growing. At an alarming rate of 100 more operations every six months. This represents a big and uncontrollable problem for the administrative staff at the Shouldice Hospital just because it becomes impossible to keep everybody satisfied. More and more people keep trying to get an operation; however, there is either no space to keep more patients or not enough doctors and nurses to attend them.

Another ongoing problem the hospital has is also due to their success. Apparently, there are some clinics in the United States that are also offering to perform the Shouldice method on their facilities. The fact, that there are other places advertising the method developed by the founder of the Shouldice Hospital it obviously represents a big contradiction for the possible customers of this institution. The main reason for this contradiction is the fact that the Shouldice Hospital does not advertise their services at all. They only rely on word of mouth. It would be a mistake to imply that this strategy has failed just because their market keeps growing and their business keeps improving. However, it would also be a mistake to imply that possible customers can be mislead with this kind of advertisement. Moreover, if the competitors perform the method wrong or there is an accident of any kind on the procedure there is the possibility