Can locker box logistics enable more human-centric medical supply chains?

Abstract

There are a range of non-clinical support services within hospitals, such as catering, linen / laundry and supply logistics, which are widely considered to have a significant effect on the delivery and quality of patient care. Supply chain activities are regarded as one of the most important owing to the potentially fatal consequences of ‘stock-outs’ (Özkil et al. 2009; Costantino et al. 2010) where key inventory becomes temporarily unavailable. As a result, hospitals typically employ inventory buffers but in spite of such practices, stock-outs still occur due to disparities in inventory requirements between the hospital and suppliers; the presence of unusual demand for specific items (Jarret 2006); and, receipt of goods which are faulty, contaminated or otherwise unfit for purpose. In such events, the supply chain needs to be agile, responding quickly in order to cater for demand. However, due to the structure of the healthcare supply chain which consists of an external chain (delivering goods to the hospital) and internal hospital chain (distributing delivered goods to end users throughout the hospital), the fast flow of goods is often stalled by the interface between the two (Aronsson et al. 2011).

This paper critically assesses the current supply chain practices implemented at Great Ormond Street Hospital (GOSH) NHS Trust in London in relation to those that could be utilised, whilst presenting a new concept of supply for key lines and items to the trust using unattended electronic locker boxes to create a more individualistic human-centric service for users, with the overall aim of improving the speed of the distribution of goods both internally (between players once inventory has arrived at the hospital) and externally (for inventory being delivered into the hospital from outside).

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Identifiers

ORCID for T.J. Cherrett: orcid.org/0000-0003-0394-5459

ORCID for Ben Waterson: orcid.org/0000-0001-9817-7119

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