What’s inside:
This blog will examine the common challenges providers encounter when managing surgical supplies in operating rooms and procedural areas.
We identify three technologies that are proving to be game-changers for OR supply data collection in these critical settings.
This blog covers:
- Common challenges in managing operating room inventory
- The vital stages of surgical supply documentation
- The value of surgical supply usage data in operational workflows
- How is image recognition and AI being used for point-of-care utilization?
- The 3 winning technologies for OR surgical supply documentation
- Award-winning Snap&Go
Common challenges in operating room inventory management
Healthcare providers face ongoing challenges in streamlining operating room inventory management, particularly in accurately documenting supplies and their consumption during procedures.
The operating room and procedural room setting is known to be a difficult data collection point in any healthcare facility. This is due to a combination of the large and complex inventory range, as well as the limitations of existing systems.
According to our customers, the issues listed below are the primary challenges faced by healthcare providers when managing inventory at the point of care.
| Issue | Details |
| Inadequate Tools | Traditional point-of-use systems often struggle to handle the complexity of collecting data from various types of surgical inventory. Data capture is an issue, as nurses often have to navigate multiple screens to correct the data collected or to manually enter items if scanners fail to capture them. |
| Data Silos | When the point-of-use system doesn’t integrate with core hospital systems, the data becomes siloed. Systems that aren’t interoperable require the nurse to make duplicate entries into multiple systems. This is not only time-consuming and frustrating, but the greater the volume of data keyed in, the higher the likelihood of errors. |
| Source of Truth | Nurses frequently resort to one-time entries for products not included in the item master, resulting in a repetitive cycle of manual input for regularly used, but unlisted items. This highlights the limitations of relying on the local item catalog, which often fails to keep pace with new stock items and coding changes. |
| External Inventory | Providers use a range of inventory, including owned stock, consignment inventory, and bill-only products, such as trunk inventory. Many of these items will not be preloaded into the system, necessitating an elongated documentation process. |
| Lack of OR Data | Ineffective data collection systems for operating room supply management disrupt crucial internal processes, including hospital supply chain management and medical billing, thereby compromising the overall efficiency of these critical operations. The lack of a clear inventory vision, coupled with inaccurate/incomplete consumption data, impedes the smooth running of operational workflows and clouds management’s understanding of OR realities. |
These same issues arise repeatedly when we discuss medical supply inventory management with healthcare providers of all types worldwide.
The stages of surgical supply documentation
The operating room is a vital data collection point for healthcare management, so ensuring that all reportable and billable items are accurately recorded is a crucial task.
Many existing surgical supply documentation systems fail to provide the streamlined data collection process that providers need.
Let’s break down the surgical documentation process into three stages and consider some of the potential issues that can arise at each stage.
- Item Capture: Providers utilize various methods to enter products into the system. It may involve manual keying-in, QR codes, RFID tags, barcode scanning, or a combination of these methods.
Operating rooms and procedural areas require a complex range of inventory, and traditional data collection methods often fail to capture all relevant data from every reportable item used in surgery.
- Item Identification: When each item is keyed in or scanned, it is referenced against the hospital’s catalog list prior to processing.
The problem is that providers find it challenging to maintain their item master with UDI code changes and new products, so it is quite common for entered items to encounter difficulties at this stage.
As stated earlier, many nurses overcome this problem by using a ‘one-time’ entry; however, this process means that the item remains unlisted, so nurses will need to manually enter that item every time, which is hardly the intention of a “one-time” entry.
- Item Documentation: Many systems are ‘stand-alone’ and do not integrate with core hospital systems. This is a significant issue, as data from OR needs to be integrated into organizational workflows. Lack of interoperability leads to duplicate data entry.
These three key stages of surgical supply documentation are the foundation of a practical point-of-use supply utilization system.
The value of OR supply usage data in operational workflows
Let’s take a quick look at why it’s so important to get accurate utilization data from OR and procedural labs.
OR Revenue: Utilization data ensures that revenue cycle management (RCM) is optimized with medical billing listing every consumed product along with the correct charge.
Inventory Management: OR product usage data helps hospitals to optimize inventory levels. By understanding the consumption patterns of medical supplies, hospitals can reduce excess stock, minimize stock wastage, improve product standardization, and ensure that essential items are consistently available when needed.
Patient Safety: Accurate data ensures that medical devices and supplies are used within recommended guidelines, reducing the risk of errors, contamination, and adverse events during surgical procedures. Full and accurate records, along with a searchable batch history, also ensure smooth and improved patient safety and recall management.
Management Data: Hospital management needs to have a clear understanding of how its second most significant area of expenditure is being managed. They need data to help them tackle areas of inefficiency, drive cost reductions, support compliance, audit standards, ensure patient safety, and deliver top-quality care.
OR and procedure room data are business intelligence that support optimal healthcare performance.
Summary of the issues at the point of care
Now that we understand the common product utilization data collection issues in the surgical setting and their organizational impact, we can address these issues effectively.
After gaining a better understanding of the challenges associated with surgical supply reporting at the point of care and identifying the limitations of existing systems and processes, we realized it was time to break the cycle of inefficiency. We set to work designing a new approach to collecting surgical supply data.
The result is Snap&Go, which utilizes a combination of advanced technologies to address the common issues that providers typically encounter.
This new healthcare technology offers a fresh, modern approach that makes barcode scanners look like relics, heralding a new era of surgical consumption data collection.
The image-to-data revolution is here.
It’s time to discover Snap&Go.
Three technology essentials for accurate point of use documentation
Let’s start by looking at the technology behind Snap&Go. What makes it so different? How can a once long-winded and inaccurate task become such a quick and precise process?
Advanced technology can integrate seamlessly with existing clinical workflows while reducing the steps required to obtain accurate surgical supply records.
So, let’s review the three stars of point-of-care supply documentation:
1. Image recognition technology is a game-changer. Computer vision is capable of capturing information on the entire packet or label and is no longer dependent on barcodes.
Nurses often report that barcodes can be an issue – there are usually multiple barcode labels, so it’s trial and error to find the one you need. There may be readability issues, and what about all those products that arrive without their packaging, or don’t contain a barcode?
Image recognition is a valuable business tool that facilitates the automation of tasks that are typically carried out by staff. The automated task becomes a low-labor, more accurate way of working.
Computer vision technology automatically identifies items from their digital image. It works in conjunction with artificial intelligence and machine learning algorithms.
2. AI and machine learning are used by the managing software to learn data patterns and process inventory data. It also helps to analyze data and generate meaningful insights and trends.
AI software is like the brain of the system. It quickly performs complex tasks with greater precision than humans. Algorithms can analyze data and identify patterns. The system ‘learns’ as it obtains more data, so that it becomes extremely useful for highlighting areas of inefficiency and supporting informed data-driven planning.
Frost & Sullivan predicts that by 2025, AI systems will be used in 90% of US and 60% of global hospitals and insurance groups.
3. Virtual item master is a cloud-based SKU database that typically gathers data from worldwide customers and provides multiple organizations with a single source of truth. The benefit is that individual providers gain access to a larger, regularly updated catalog of information.
A significant benefit of a virtual item master (VIM) is that dynamic data is centrally managed yet collaboratively populated and updated. This means that the data is far more likely to keep track of new products and item data changes. At the user level, it significantly enhances the ability to identify items at the point of care automatically.
How is image recognition and AI being used in point-of-care software?
Image recognition, AI, and machine learning technology, combined with access to a global SKU database, is the winning combination that the healthcare sector has been waiting for.
Finally, an efficient method for achieving 100% item documentation and charge capture in the EHR.
Let’s go back to the three essential stages of surgical supply documentation and see how Snap&Go performs under each criterion.
- Item Capture: Snap&Go captures all the required data on every single product, whether it’s a stock item, consignment inventory, or bill-only product.
How it works: The nurse simply places the product packet or label under the computer vision sensor. Image recognition technology ‘reads’ the image, and in just 3 seconds all relevant data (such as UDI, batch number, expiry date), is captured. Handwritten implant sheets can also be ‘read’ and digitally documented.
- Item Identification: With Snap&Go, identifying the products captured in surgery no longer relies on the hospital item master.
How it works: All items that aren’t recognized locally are referenced against a globally populated SKU database, which worldwide customers update every time they ‘snap’ an item. This finally ends the reliance on local item masters, which are so difficult to maintain. If an item is not recognized, INDENTI’s back-office team will handle any exceptions.
IDENTI also provides the healthcare provider with a report on all items recorded by Snap&Go that were missing or incorrectly recorded in the local item master, ensuring the ongoing maintenance of the local item master by hospital staff.
- Item Documentation: Full interoperability with hospital systems ensures that consumption data is shared promptly with core hospital systems.
How it works: Seamless integration between Snap&Go and the ERP, EMR, and MMIS ensures the prompt transfer of the vital OR data that drives so many operational and administrative processes.
Award-winning Snap&Go
Snap&Go’s innovative approach to solving the inventory documentation challenges of healthcare providers is being recognized as a breakthrough technology.
Last year, Snap&Go received a New Product Innovation Award for Operating Room Inventory Management Solutions Industry from Frost and Sullivan. This award recognizes companies that “consolidate their leadership positions by innovating and creating new products, solutions, and services that meet ever-evolving customer needs.”
This year, Snap&Go was awarded the Vizient Innovation Technology Designation. Kelly Flaharty, Vizient Senior Director of Contract Services, stated, “Health care experts on Vizient customer-led councils evaluated SNAP&GO as part of the Innovative Technology Program. This designation indicates that SNAP&GO has one or more qualities that differentiate it from similar products and have the potential to make an incremental improvement in healthcare. Congratulations to IDENTI Medical.”
We’re proud to receive recognition from Frost & Sullivan and Vizient for our cutting-edge and innovative technology.
See what a former Director of Perioperative Services had to say about the challenges of OR surgical supply documentation, and how Snap&Go offers a solution to all of these issues.
The use of image recognition, AI, and machine learning breaks the cycle of inadequate point-of-use systems.
Ultimately, a custom solution tailored to the surgical setting is available to accomplish the task.
Implementing the right healthcare inventory management system, including at the point of care, is crucial for the precise management of inventory in healthcare.
Contact us to learn more about streamlining your surgical supply data collection and enhancing your digital operating room with Snap&Go.
