ABSTRACT
The current situation of healthcare units is characterised by the increasing cost of providing the respective care, the consequent deterioration of the financial situation, and the complicated and time-consuming processes. Together with rising demand, they may become factors contributing to a decrease in service demand. Due to this situation, more efficient and effective logistics and supply chain management are widely recognised as one of the main areas for improvement. To provide insight on which areas to improve, several objectives were looked at in this work, including the analysis of the methods and criteria for the selection of medicines in hospital pharmacies, the definition of obstacles to the rational management of stocks, and the analysis of historical data to forecast future demand for a Portuguese public hospital. The study revealed that some of the 1346 products present on the pharmacy's ERP do not have sufficient historical data to create an accurate forecast. In this context, and with a service level of 95%, 41% of products have a stock higher than what should be the maximum stock, amounting to approximately € 147.908.87 in fixed assets, and 11% of products were at risk of being out of stock at the time. The importance of the evolution of the core information system of hospitals was at stake, ensuring the technological sustainability of the ongoing digital transformation, alignment with ICT rationalisation measures, improvement of customer service, and improvement of the quality of information available to the user. © 2023, The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG.
ABSTRACT
Available studies and reports, as well as real-time experiences, attest to profound, extensive, long-lasting effects on the supply chain caused by the pandemic. It is thus paramount to rethink the supply chain for medication and health care supplies to build a more resilient and adaptable management process. Data obtained from the NHS portal monthly reports from January 2017 to August 2020 – indicates that at the hospital level the impact was felt the most on the scheduling of medical appointments and prescriptions. Two forecasting methods were selected for this study: Simple Linear Regression and Holt-Winters with the trend and additive seasonality. There was a change in the behavior of hospital patients in the first year of COVID-19 pandemics. This change was shown in two main indicators, the number of hospital consultations and medication expenses. This changed behavior resulted in a decrease in demand for scheduled hospital services, 1.9M less than would be expected under normal conditions, and a foreseeable increase of €432M in the consumption of medicines in the last quarter of 2020, €103M more than in the same period. from the previous year. © 2023, The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG.