Sustainable Operating Room Supply Chains: A Case for Dynamic Physician Preference Cards
Main Article Content
Abstract
This paper presents a model that can be applied to improve the tracking of surgical instruments. At present hospitals are faced with a problem of underutilization and waste of surgical resources leading to excess ordering of supplies without completely using the inventory at hand. A simulation was created to highlight the importance of regularly updating Physician Preference Cards (PPC) using input from surgical supplies utilization to better inform supplies purchasing and creation of surgical kits for Operation Rooms (OR). The model built brings to attention the potential cost savings, and waste reduction benefits of using dynamic PPCs instead of the current method of using static PPCs that do not take actual utilization of materials and supplies into consideration. Using dynamic PPCs presents an opportunity to saving upwards of 52% including inventory and surgical supplies costs. Better data integration between systems can facilitate accurate estimations of utilization rates which should in turn inform supply planning and frequent PPC updating.
Keywords:
Utilization, Physician Preference Cards, Operation Rooms, Sustainable
Article Details
How to Cite
HANDFIELD, Robert; SADEGHI, Amir Hossein; SAHEBI-FAKHRABAD, Amirreza.
Sustainable Operating Room Supply Chains: A Case for Dynamic Physician Preference Cards.
Medical Research Archives, [S.l.], v. 13, n. 4, apr. 2025.
ISSN 2375-1924.
Available at: <https://esmed.org/MRA/mra/article/view/6508>. Date accessed: 05 dec. 2025.
doi: https://doi.org/10.18103/mra.v13i4.6508.
Section
Research Articles
The Medical Research Archives grants authors the right to publish and reproduce the unrevised contribution in whole or in part at any time and in any form for any scholarly non-commercial purpose with the condition that all publications of the contribution include a full citation to the journal as published by the Medical Research Archives.
References
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2. Estrera SL. Improving Operating Room Supply Chain Efficiency and Cost-Reduction Using Data Analytics. UCLA; 2024.
3. Rigante L, Moudrous W, de Vries J, Grotenhuis AJ, Boogaarts HD. Operating room waste: disposable supply utilization in neurointerventional procedures. Acta Neurochir (Wien). 2017;159:2337-2340.
4. Zygourakis CC, Yoon S, Valencia V, et al. Operating room waste: disposable supply utilization in neurosurgical procedures. Journal of neurosurgery. 2017;126:620-625.
5. Yates EF, Bowder AN, Roa L, et al. Empowering surgeons, anesthesiologists, and obstetricians to incorporate environmental sustainability in the operating room. Annals of surgery. 2021;273(6):1108-1114.
6. Wu S, Cerceo E. Sustainability initiatives in the operating room. The Joint Commission Journal on Quality and Patient Safety. 2021;47(10):663-672.
7. Park KW, Dickerson C. Can efficient supply management in the operating room save millions? Current Opinion in Anesthesiology. 2009;22(2): 242-248.
8. Ahmadi E, Masel DT, Metcalf AY, Schuller K. Inventory management of surgical supplies and sterile instruments in hospitals: a literature review. Health Systems. 2019;8(2):134-151.
9. Man LC, Lin Y, Pang G, Sanderson J, Duan K. Digitalization to achieve greener healthcare supply chain. Journal of Cleaner Production. Published online 2024:142802.
10. Chasseigne V, Leguelinel-Blache G, Nguyen TL, et al. Assessing the costs of disposable and reusable supplies wasted during surgeries. International Journal of Surgery. 2018;53:18-23.
11. Kwon IWG, Kim SH, Martin DG. Healthcare supply chain management; strategic areas for quality and financial improvement. Technological forecasting and social change. 2016;113:422-428.
12. Moons K, Waeyenbergh G, Pintelon L. Measuring the logistics performance of internal hospital supply chains--a literature study. Omega. 2019;82:205-217.
13. Avinash B, Joseph G. Reimagining healthcare supply chains: a systematic review on digital transformation with specific focus on efficiency, transparency and responsiveness. Journal of Health Organization and Management. 2024;38(8):1255-1279.
14. Baltera RM. How to Run a Cost-Effective Operating Room: Opportunities for Efficiency and Cost-Savings. Hand Clinics. Published online 2024.
15. Dreyfus D, Nair A, Rosales C. The impact of planning and communication on unplanned costs in surgical episodes of care: implications for reducing waste in hospital operating rooms. Journal of Operations Management. 2020;66(1-2):91-111.
16. Albert MG, Rothkopf DM. Operating room waste reduction in plastic and hand surgery. Plastic Surgery. 2015;23(4):235-238.
17. Brauer DG, Hawkins WG, Strasberg SM, et al. Cost variation in a laparoscopic cholecystectomy and the association with outcomes across a single health system: implications for standardization and improved resource utilization. HPB. 2015;17(12): 1113-1118.
18. Millet C, Chimento G, Barrette W, Dasa V. Can automating surgical processes reduce operating room supply costs? A pilot study of a novel OR based technology. Journal of Orthopaedic Experience & Innovation. 2020;1(1).
19. Magno-Padron DA, Holoyda KA, Moss W, et al. Elective surgery resource utilization. Langenbeck’s Archives of Surgery. Published online 2022:1-5.
20. Harvey LFB, Smith KA, Curlin H. Physician engagement in improving operative supply chain efficiency through review of surgeon preference cards. Journal of minimally invasive gynecology. 2017;24(7):1116-1120.
21. Scheinker D, Hollingsworth M, Brody A, et al. The design and evaluation of a novel algorithm for automated preference card optimization. Journal of the American Medical Informatics Association. 2021;28(6):1088-1097.
22. Schmidt RN, Posteraro RH, Lopez M. Reducing Waste in the Operating Room Through Inventory-Based Supply Chain Optimization. ASBBS Proceedings. 2019;26:476-483.
23. Cozzoli N, Salvatore FP, Faccilongo N, Milone M. How can big data analytics be used for healthcare organization management? Literary framework and future research from a systematic review. BMC health services research. 2022;22(1): 809.
24. Dash S, Shakyawar SK, Sharma M, Kaushik S. Big data in healthcare: management, analysis and future prospects. Journal of big data. 2019;6(1):1-25.
25. Olaronke I, Oluwaseun O. Big data in healthcare: Prospects, challenges and resolutions. In: 2016 Future Technologies Conference (FTC). ; 2016:1152-1157.
26. Hermon R, Williams PAH. Big data in healthcare: What is it used for? Published online 2014.
27. Alazab M, Khan LU, Koppu S, et al. Digital twins for healthcare 4.0—Recent advances, architecture, and open challenges. IEEE Consumer Electronics Magazine. 2022;12(6):29-37.
28. Croatti A, Gabellini M, Montagna S, Ricci A. On the integration of agents and digital twins in healthcare. Journal of Medical Systems. 2020;44 (9):161.
29. Kaul R, Ossai C, Forkan ARM, et al. The role of AI for developing digital twins in healthcare: The case of cancer care. Wiley Interdisciplinary Reviews: Data Mining and Knowledge Discovery. 2023;13 (1):e1480.
30. Saver C. Manage physician preference cards to boost efficiency and patient safety. OR manager. 2016;32(3):14-16.