An industry call to action
In 2024, we need to call on the healthcare industry—providers and suppliers alike—to increase transparency about the cost of medical instrument ownership.
To hospitals and healthcare providers: Your endoscopes and other surgical equipment are not disposable instruments. They are critical assets for your facility, and how you treat these assets directly affects your ability to provide the best care possible.
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Endoscopes and other medical instruments are fragile. A technologist walking a scope from one room to another and inadvertently bumping the tip of a scope into a metal table may cause thousands of dollars in damage. A scope that isn’t appropriately flushed, cleaned, or sterilized may be terminally damaged or require replacement of expensive parts. Technologists and other staff must be educated in instrument handling, and hospital time needs to be allotted to training. The cost of instrument replacement far exceeds the cost and time of proper instrument handling training.
To manufacturers of endoscopes and other expensive medical instrumentation: Manufacturer service and repair contracts are important documents, and the cost and limitations of services need to be addressed prior to instrument acquisition—in a clear and transparent way. Service agreements without training components, transparent billing, and commitment to instrument lifecycle maximization should not be offered.
To instrument repair companies: Stop capitated service agreements that hide costs and incentivize the retiring of perfectly good scopes. Provide transparency about billing numbers and costs, and take the necessary steps to hire competent technicians, source the right parts, and provide the best service possible to healthcare providers.
Transparency about medical instrument ownership is not a nice-to-have. At a time where patients need access to healthcare providers and reimbursement doesn’t cover provider costs, the actual cost of instrument ownership directly impacts patient care.
Let’s make 2024 about cost transparency and instrument stewardship.
About the author: Kevin Liszewski is the CEO of Encore Medical Device Repair.Back to HCB News
