From the July 2012 issue of HealthCare Business News magazine


“This would amount to an estimated total of $4 to 10 billion in increased costs to the industry,” he says.

But of greater concern is how this could affect patient safety.

“Hospitals are under big budget constraints so if a department has to do more work, they probably won’t get a budget increase to hire more people. So that means something else won’t get done and that’s what we’re afraid of. Those other things have more impact on patient safety than some of the maintenance activity,” says Gaev.

Some hospitals are in the middle of reviewing their programs to make room for these changes, while a few anticipate minimal impact because they’ve been following manufacturers’ guidelines all along.

But Ritter speculates that some hospitals may risk not taking any action, in part because they are hopeful that organizations like ECRI Institute will be able to convince CMS that the Joint Commission’s process works well.

Banding together for biomeds
Since the directive was issued, the Joint Commission, ECRI Institute, the Association for the Advancement of Medical Instrumentation, the American Society for Healthcare Engineering and other experts in the field have been working together to show CMS that the Joint Commission’s accreditation process for medical equipment and facilities equipment maintenance is safe and adequate.

“We have some maintenance data from the Biomedical- Benchmark product we have developed over the last several years that will help support this position,” says Ritter.

Further, ECRI Institute is looking into developing a study with the Joint Commission comparing equipment maintained strictly according to the manufacturers’ recommendations with maintenance that has deviated from manufacturers’ recommendations.

ECRI also recommends developing an outside advisory board for CMS.

“It would be very desirable for people who work in the field to review not only this directive but future regulations that CMS might be considering, to determine how we can best ensure the safety and reliability of equipment,” says Ritter.

Although it’s uncertain at this point if CMS will amend the rule, Baretich says they have been receptive to discussion, and open to seeing the data.

DOTmed Registered 2012 - July DMBN: Test Equipment Companies

Names in boldface are Premium Listings.
Domestic
Julio Castro, Pronk Technologies, CA
Bruce Smith, Medical Systems Technologies, CO
DOTmed Certified
TOM GRAHAM, CLINICAL RESOURCES INC, MD
Michael Minch, BiCOM Inc., NY

International
Cicero Oliveira, Kuf Electronics, Brazil
Juan Manuel Esquivel Martinez, X-Ray Sistemas Medicos, Mexico
moito maekawa, medicalserv, Brazil

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