An interview with Anna Gawrońska-Błaszczyk, an employee of the Institute of Logistics and Warehousing – the GS1 national organization in Poland, and a specialist in the dissemination of GS1 system standards.
Izabela Wielicka: We have all been complaining for years about the healthcare system and the quality of medical services provided. Management staff in healthcare centers, and especially in hospitals, have a tough nut to crack. Financial outlays for healthcare are largely insufficient. The difficult economic situation forces the healthcare system to constantly look for savings. Is economical management only about limiting the purchase of medicines and dressing materials and reducing the number of admitted patients? It is rather difficult to accept such a tactic.
Anna Gawrońska-Błaszczyk: Limiting the purchase of medicines and medical materials does indeed help to lower costs by reducing excessive stocks, but it should be the result of conscious and justified decisions, not the effect of thoughtless or accidental actions. On the other hand, the attempt to artificially limit the number of admitted patients conflicts with the basic goal of every hospital unit, which is to provide medical services to patients. Economical management should consist of verifying the way of conducting business, and as a result, eliminating unnecessary and unproductive activities and streamlining and optimizing the necessary ones.
I.W.: Are the problems of the healthcare system solely the result of a bad economic situation? What other difficulties are hospital units struggling with?
A.G.-B.: Indeed, the difficult situation of many public hospitals and insufficient financial outlays for the operation of these hospitals mean that instead of focusing on their core business, hospitals focus resources and time on finding various sources of savings. According to the results of regularly conducted research, the deteriorating economic situation and loss of financial liquidity affect a significant part of public healthcare facilities. Furthermore, not all financial-accounting and material systems implemented by Polish hospitals, as well as systems for handling patient traffic and pharmacies that are at the implementation stage, analyze the obtained data in terms of optimizing processes occurring in the hospital and tracking costs generated by the patient. They lack modules for monitoring demand and optimizing the size of maintained stocks of medicines and medical materials. These applications do not have the capability for electronic data exchange with suppliers, which necessitates manual entry of data from commercial documents. Despite this state of affairs, one can increasingly hear or read about hospitals that express interest in implementing solutions aimed at improving intra-hospital processes.
I.W.: So what solutions can improve this difficult situation?
A.G.-B.: As initial experiences show, by applying logistics solutions proven in other industries, it is possible to quickly improve the efficiency of a hospital’s operation, reduce its operating costs, and limit risk factors affecting patient safety in the hospital. This leads to the release of significant financial resources for its core business – treating patients. It is estimated that the outlays necessary only for material management can reach up to 15% of a hospital’s budget. Research results show that many European hospitals have managed to improve logistics in their facilities thanks to:
• implementing effective inventory management models,
• automating the flow of information using barcode technology and electronic data interchange (EDI),
• building partnership relations with patients, suppliers of medicines and medical materials.
To this end, it is necessary, among other things, to use uniform solutions by all partners in the supply chain. This applies to uniform identifiers, for example, for medicines, patients, medical personnel, locations, and a common format for electronic data exchange for everyone. It is precisely these standards that have been developed and implemented by GS1 for over 30 years.
I.W.: What role does GS1 play in healthcare?
A.G.-B.: GS1 plays the role of an integrator in healthcare – an independent institution bringing together the actors of this extremely complex industry. GS1 solutions are gaining increasing global recognition and are currently recommended by institutions such as: the European Commission, EFPIA, EUCOMED, FDA, and the Ministries of Health of Great Britain, New Zealand, and Canada. In Poland, we conduct information and educational activities aimed at drawing the attention of government institutions to the need to develop common and uniform solutions for the industry, which are independent of technology and are fully open, secure, and applicable by all participants in the supply chain.
I.W.: In which hospitals in Poland have such solutions already been implemented?
A.G.-B.: In the years 2003-2005, the Provincial Specialist Hospital in Wrocław, in cooperation with the Institute of Logistics and Warehousing, carried out a project aimed at improving the management of the flow of medicines and medical materials and the automatic registration of material costs of medical procedures. The implementation of an integrated system supporting the hospital’s logistics sphere allowed for a significant improvement in monitoring the consumption of medicines and medical materials, and consequently, gaining knowledge about the real picture of the distribution of the hospital’s operating costs.
I.W.: Did the use of automatic identification in this hospital contribute to improving its functioning? How do the hospital managers evaluate this solution?
A.G.-B.: An analysis of the economic efficiency of the project implemented according to the described assumptions showed high profitability of this type of investment. As a result of the synergy of actions, a decrease in medicine stocks in the Central Pharmacy by approx. 40% was observed. Similar effects are observed in foreign facilities, where thanks to the use of agreed global solutions, independent of technology, the functioning of hospitals has been improved and far-reaching benefits have been achieved in the form of:
• Full information about tracked products and materials
• Full information about the material costs of patient treatment
• Time and financial savings
• Optimization of inventory management
• Optimization of the medical service planning process
• Optimization of the patient flow process and use of medical equipment
• Elimination of duplicating activities
• Reduction of hospital operating costs
• Greater patient safety
I.W.: Thank you very much for the conversation.
A.G.-B.: Thank you very much!