A comprehensive study on the maintenance of medical equipment at tertiary care hospital in India

Vijay Kumar Tadia; Samadhan Kharate

doi:10.18203/2320-6012.ijrms20200034

Authors

Vijay Kumar Tadia Department of Hospital Administration, AIIMS, New Delhi, India
Samadhan Kharate Department of Health and Travel Underwriting and Product Development, Reliance General Insurance Company Limited, Mumbai, Maharashtra, India

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.18203/2320-6012.ijrms20200034

Keywords:

Biomedical engineering, Equipment maintenance, Equipment breakdown, Maintenance contract

Abstract

Background: It is essential for any health-care facility, regardless of its size, to implement a maintenance programme for medical equipment. The maintenance not only has a positive impact on the safety and effectiveness of healthcare technology, but also increases the lifetime of equipment and thus helps to save scarce investment resources. It also enhances the demand for health services. Demand for services availability is crucial of functioning healthcare technology.

Methods: A comprehensive descriptive study of the maintenance of equipment at a tertiary care corporate hospital in India from January 2012 to May 2012. A convenient sampling method was used to capture data from Key Participants which included two categories of staff viz technicians and managers/administrators. There were 40 technicians and 10 managers who responded to the questionnaire. Both the primary and secondary sources of data were used.

Results: Breakdown data analysis showed that the major cause of breakdown was human errors. About 40% of breakdown that occurred in the hospital was mainly because of manual errors followed by electrical and mechanical issues. Average down time for the time period of 5 months came to around 19 hours, which was quite high. Analysis of KAP questionnaire showed that about 55% technicians were not having the educational qualification required for handling the medical equipment, about 15% were not given training at the time of purchase of the equipment. Similarly, few managers were not aware about maintenance practices and importance of maintenance management for smooth and efficient functioning.

Conclusions: Good and effective maintenance practices can reduce the cost of maintenance of equipment that arises due to breakdown. The training of equipment users and maintenance managers reduces the equipment downtime. To reduce the possibility of equipment malfunction following service or repair, all personnel involved in maintaining and servicing equipment should be trained.

Metrics

Metrics Loading ...

References

Mkalaf KA. A Study of Current Maintenance Strategies and the Reliability of Critical Medical Equipment in Hospitals in Relation to Patient Outcomes. Available at: https://ro.uow.edu.au/theses/4676. Accessed 29 December 2019.

Derrico P, Ritrovato M, Nocchi F, Faggiano F, Capussotto C, Franchin T, et al. Clinical engineering. Applied Biomed Engin. 2011 Aug;23:169-94.

Miniati R, Dori F, Iadanza E, Fregonara MM, Gentili GB. Health technology management: A database analysis as support of technology managers in hospitals. Technol Health Care. 2011 Jan 1;19(6):445-54.

Sezdi M. Two different maintenance strategies in the hospital environment: preventive maintenance for older technology devices and predictive maintenance for newer high-tech devices. J Healthcare Engin. 2016;2016:1-16.

Chaudhary P, Kaul P. Factors affecting utilization of medical diagnostic equipment: a study at a tertiary healthcare setup of Chandigarh. Chrismed J Health Res. 2015 Oct 1;2(4):316.

Mather D. Maintenance Management - The Planned State. Available at: http://www.maintenanceworld.com/maintenance-management-the-planned-state. Accessed 26 December 2019.

Fincher N. Tackling capital maintenance costs. Available at: https://www.healthcarefinancenews.com/news/tackling-capital-maintenance-costs. Accessed 26 December 2019.

National Health Systems Resource Center. Biomedical Equipment management and maintenance program. Available at: http://nhsrcindia.org/sites/default/files/practice_file. Accessed 29 December 2019.

Mutia D, Kihiu J, Maranga S. Maintenance Management of Medical Equipment in Hospitals. Digital Reposit. 2012;2(3).

Al-Bashir A, Al-Tawarah A, Jawwad AK. Downtime reduction on medical equipment maintenance at the directorate of biomedical engineering in the Jordanian MOH. Inter J Online Biomed Engin. 2017 Feb 27;13(02):4-17.

Thapa R, Saldanha S, Prakash R. Application of lean six-sigma approach to reduce biomedical equipments breakdown time and associated defects. J Evolut Medical Dental Sci. 2018 Aug 20;7(34):3771-9.