To the Editor:
As I read the article, “Laboratory: Final frontier for performance improvement?” in the May 2017 edition of Healthcare Purchasing News, I recalled my personal experience as a newly hired Director of Materials Management trying to work with Nursing and the Laboratory in 1972!
My previous job was in purchasing for an aircraft manufacturer. I was hired to lead Materials Management at a 90-year old, 250-bed, religious-owned-and-operated primary care facility that was building a new 250-bed facility nine miles away. It was to be a Gordon Friesen-concept hospital with clinical revenue-generating services performed by the various clinical service personnel. All other services were to be assigned to non-clinical departments.
The Friesen concept of “supply, processing and distribution” in one functional area was designed to generate cost savings and improve management. Adapting Friesen’s concepts on space limitation and changes in overall supply management concepts would be of service to all users in the hospital.
The welcoming reaction I received was mixed. Nursing Management felt I was needed to help relieve shortages that occurred, but only to a degree. The Laboratory felt they did a good job, and that their storeroom offered all they needed.
The Lab Director was a bit defensive because she already maintained a storeroom and a working procedure with purchasing. The Lab Department personnel got a Purchase Order form from purchasing and attached a handwritten list of items on the Purchase Order form to be furnished directly to the hospital by the supplier. This made receiving work difficult and invoice-paying complex.
When I approached the Lab Director she was very adamant that purchasing or storeroom staff could not handle the complex items needed for a complex laboratory. Being a new hire, I told purchasing to continue the procurement method, but to make a file of every PO generated in this manner.
After several months, I analyzed these complex material purchases and discovered that about 95 percent of the buys were storeroom shelf supply items. In some cases we were paying two different prices for the same supplies.
I shared this data with the Lab Director. After much discussion, we reached a consensus: Purchasing personnel would procure supplies from the same suppliers contracts as Lab Personnel formerly used. Frequently ordered shelf items would be stored in the hospital storeroom. Laboratory personnel returned to laboratory clinical work and purchases were made through the Purchasing Department.
Lab’s new partnership with Purchasing was tested when the manufacturer of frequently used analytical equipment could not supply paper rolls for the machine. The Lab Director came to us, and we solved the problem through contract negotiations that generated a cost savings for the Lab and its appreciation for our services.
That’s why I have a difficult time understanding why Lab Directors are so reluctant to use Supply Chain and its experienced personnel and frequently stymie management with their explanations.
Maybe Supply Chain executives have to learn to apply sales and service principles and techniques to their professional relationships with other departments.
In the early 1970s, Materials Management was part of the progressive changes in the hospital environment. But after nearly 50 years, all parties should have figured out by now how to adapt and determine the most cost effective processes for their facilities. That includes making sure all departments perform duties based on their education, experience and training and that those clinical and operational duties align with the goals of the departments and the hospital.
I personally would be embarrassed if I were a senior Supply Chain executive today, and the Laboratory was still using Laboratory personnel to do supply chain tasks.
Norm Krumrey
Retired hospital Supply Chain executive
Bellwether Class of 2014
