ABSTRACT
Hospitals are under constant pressure to control health costs (Aguado et al. 2007). In order to cut costs, the optimization of asset management within healthcare appears to be an important issue (Bates et al. 2001). In hospitals, high-value mobile assets (e.g. blood, beds, instruments, surgical devices) are often misplaced, lost, or stolen. It is common for a hospital to loose 10% of its inventory annually (Wicks et al. 2006). This is mainly due to the fact that no one in a hospital has real-time information about where movable assets are because these resources are frequently moved due to emergency necessity responses in different locations. As such, it is a “normal” situation for nurses to spend a great deal of time tracking down appropriate assets so that they are delivered on time. In fact, hospitals have difficulty to locate 15-20% of their assets due to inappropriate and ineffective monitoring procedures (Li et al. 2006). In this context, healthcare organizations are searching for answers to reduce operational costs while, at the same time, facilitating healthcare delivery in order to offer patients with highly reliable care service. Bates et al. (2001) conclude that appropriate use of technology in healthcare could result in process simplification and substantial improvement in patient safety. Establishing a traceability system is a key enabler
will also need to be investigated in order to analyze the general surgical workflow.
