How Digitising Existing Processes Can Improve Track & Traceability, Cost Control, and Patient Outcomes
The Challenge with Current Loan Kit Management Processes
Across the NHS, orthopaedic loan kits play a critical role in surgical procedures, yet there’s no standardised way of managing them.
Current loan kit management processes are outdated manual methods which can be prone to human error, consisting of paper-based diaries, whiteboards, email trails, voicemails and illegible scanned documents. This inefficient, fragmented approach creates added pressures, accountability gaps, financial waste and provides poor visibility.
Additionally, each loan kit supplier has their own unique way of receiving an order and with approximately 30 different suppliers in the marketplace, this means staff must order in 30 different ways.
Despite staffs’ best efforts, current processes can pose a compliance risk, frequently resulting in lost kits, significant avoidable cost and delays patient to care.
With healthcare budgets under immense pressure and improved patient outcomes the top priority, what is the answer?
Digitisation.
Digitising and standardising the loan kit process to not only meet, but exceed, MHRA and GIRFT requirements.
By digitally standardising loan kit management best practice, Trusts can plan surgeries more efficiently to reduce waitlists, make informed consignment decisions to save unnecessary rental costs, and free up valuable staff to focus on patient care.
Understanding the Scale of the Problem
Compliance Risks: Regulatory bodies such as GIRFT, MHRA, and CQC are pushing for greater transparency and accountability in medical device and resource management. Non-compliance due to poor tracking systems can result in audit failures, financial penalties, and increased patient risk.
Supply Chain Disruptions: The lack of real-time tracking for loan kits creates unpredictable shortages, forcing hospitals to make last-minute emergency orders that disrupt procurement planning whilst inflating costs. When kits are unaccounted for, surgical teams often receive incomplete or incorrect sets, requiring additional coordination causing further setbacks.
Surgical Delays: Estimates suggest that up to 10% of surgeries face delays due to missing or late loan kits. The operational impact is significant, affecting patient outcomes and increasing backlog pressure. In some cases, delays caused by missing kits can extend patient waiting times by weeks, or even months, contributing to an already overburdened system.
Workload pressure: Clinical and procurement teams can spend countless hours manually logging, tracking, searching for lost kits, and reconciling invoices – valuable time that could be spent on patient care.
Financial Losses: Loan kit procurement inefficiencies are estimated to cost the NHS £Millions annually, with lost kits, vast amounts of invoice dispute charges and urgent delivery fee’s contributing to the unnecessary expenditure.
How Digitising Existing Processes Can Improve Track & Traceability, Cost Control, and Patient Outcomes
The NHS is already benefitting from the digital transformation in patient records, scheduling, and full-scale Inventory Management Systems – so why not loan kits?
While full-scale Inventory Management Systems are transforming hospital-wide inventory management, their focus is solely internal, they’re not specifically designed for the complexities of managing the entire loan kit & implant process – where kits are delivered and moved between different internal and external hospital, sterile services and suppliers, sites.
A purpose built, lightweight, digital track-and-trace platform that can be economically implemented as a standalone solution / or to complement your existing Inventory Management System, could revolutionise current loan kit management processes in the following key areas:
Accessibility and Usability
Intuitive Interface: Easy-to-use, intuitive design reduces training time – allowing for rapid adoption across teams.
Role-Based Access: Multi-user functionality with permissions for administrators, clinical staff, and suppliers – ensuring safe and secure use.
Compliant Integration with Existing Systems
NHS Integration: Interfaces seamlessly with Oracle/NEP, and other healthcare financial systems – enabling smooth, automated reconciliation and invoicing to streamline procurement workflows.
Regulatory & Supplier Compliance: Fully supports Scan4Safety, GS1, and PEPPOL standards – ensuring alignment with the NHS & all loan kit suppliers.
Significant Cost Reduction
Reduced Loan Kit Costs: Automatically stops the rental when the kit is marked for collection – significantly reducing unnecessary cost.
Reduced Shipping Costs: Enables proactive planning and demand forecasting – significantly reducing expensive next-day and same-day delivery costs.
Optimising Operations
Optimises Wait Lists: Supports GIRFT’s ‘8642’ theatre productivity standard – reducing patient wait times, scheduling conflicts, and surgery cancellations.
Error Reduction: Automated system that provides specific kit names – eliminating staff having to clarify vague kit requests, deal with lost paperwork, scrubbed whiteboards, miscommunication, and ineligible scanned documents.
Transparent Data
Live Analytics Dashboard: Provides frequency of kit usage, costs, and supplier performance – enabling full visibility of loan kit spend for informed procurement decisions.
Remain Audit Ready: Simplifies compliance by delivering accurate, audit-ready reports on sterilisation compliance – promoting staff and patient safety.
Staff Morale and Productivity
Improves Staff Morale: Frees staff from laborious current systems; manual diaries, whiteboards, emails, and scanned documents – improving staff engagement and job satisfaction.
Improves Inter-Departmental collaboration: reducing friction between internal departments that don’t talk to each other.
Sustainability Goals
Reduces Paper & Waste: Eliminates reliance on manual consumables – reducing waste and operational costs.
Lowers Carbon Footprint: Optimises kit logistics, reducing unnecessary deliveries, failed collections, and last-minute surgical cancellations – reducing transport emissions.
Strengthening Supplier Relationships
Live Collaboration: Provides a real-time messaging platform between hospital and supplier staff, ensuring seamless, documented communication.
Supplier Benchmarking: Tracks supplier performance data, helping hospitals identify their most reliable partners whilst informing long-term contract negotiations.
Automated Invoicing: Ensures timely PO payments, preventing overdue invoices and avoiding sites reluctantly being placed on ‘stop’ by suppliers.
Dispute Reduction: Resolves 9/10 supplier-side disputes related to missing or damaged items, improving accountability and financial efficiency.
Advanced Kit Visibility: Pre-alerts suppliers when kits are being returned with missing, damaged, or used items, allowing them for proactive stock management, faster replenishment bolstering the partnership.
Overcoming Implementation Challenges
While the benefits are clear, deployment low-cost, and lightweight, some may see implementation barriers.
However, a pragmatic rollout strategy ensures success:
- Pilot Programs: ‘Lite’ pilots for elective orthopaedics are about to start at some major NHS Trusts, paving the way for others to follow whilst their case-studies – demonstrating ROI before full deployment – are eagerly awaited by many other Trusts.
- Training & Support: Highly skilled and experienced ex-NHS staff ease understanding and onboarding for long-term success.
- Seamless Integration: A purpose-built solution designed specifically to seamlessly interface with existing NHS infrastructure, requirements, mandates and workflows.
By addressing these concerns upfront, Trusts can rest assured of a smooth transformation to loan kit digitisation!
Conclusion
Now is the Time to Revolutionise Loan Kit Management!
To find out how, visit Stand 14 at the upcoming DAS Conference where our friendly team will be delighted to welcome you and discuss how our innovative new app – ‘Ingenica Loan Kit’, can digitally transform your loan kit process:
Ingenica Loan Kit brings NHS Trusts and Loan Kit Suppliers onto the same easy-to-use digital platform, standardising and automating the entire loan kit process in compliance with MHRA and GIRFT requirements.
Also, be sure to attend the ‘Loan Sets, Track & Trace, and Procurement’ panel debate at the conference!
Hosted by
Sharon Fox – Head of Decontamination – University Hospitals Birmingham & Richard Merch Sabino – Medical Device Coordinator – Contracts – Central London Community Healthcare NHS Trust.
Author
Tom McNally – Sales Consultant – Ingenica Solutions