Supply Management for Home Healthcare Services

As a consequence of escalating costs of healthcare and aging populations, developed countries are moving away from institutional care and towards home healthcare where possible, in situations where visiting healthcare providers can provide regular support for patients in a home environment. In this paper, we discuss a project to develop a system that supports mobile wireless devices for visiting nurses, in place of an existing paper-based system. The wireless system allows nurses to securely access, update and query a central database containing patient information. One of the applications developed for this project is supplies management, where nurses can, during regular client visits, order replenishment stock to be delivered to the site by a supplier. We describe the detailed development of an “As-Is” business process map, leading to a significantly improved “To-Be” process to realize the expected benefits. A model of the ordering/logistics process was also developed, to evaluate supply service policy options that could further optimize supplies management.