CASE STUDY
HOW STANDARDIZATION LED TO
CONSISTENCY, VISIBILITY, AND LESS RISK
Improving your cold storage through standardization
THE FACILITY
The hospital facility is the fagship location of a widely-recognized integrated, not-for-
proft healthcare system. This location boasts yearly net patient revenues of over $2B
and over 38,000 annual discharges.
As the main campus of a leading health system in medical research and patient
care, the organization’s core values of innovation, excellence both for patients and
staff, and stewardship of resources demanded this problem be addressed. Every
temperature excursion was an opportunity for a drug to lose safety or viability, causing
danger to patients and fnancial loss to the hospital.
INTENDED OUTCOME
With over 1,000 staffed beds and several outpatient facilities to support, the pharmacy
manager at this nationally-recognized research hospital was looking to streamline
oversight of the eighty-fve pieces of cold storage equipment responsible for storing
and distributing life-saving vaccines and medications across her facility.
Her existing cold storage feet included a collection of mismatched units from
various vendors that required a staggering 1,000 manual log recordings per week.
Recognizing the value of consistent monitoring and the immense burden of weekly
manual temperature logs, the pharmacy director installed a remote-monitoring system
to track cold storage performance in real time.
Not long after the installation of the new monitoring equipment, performance issues
began to surface in the cold storage feet. The facility was experiencing temperature
excursions in some of their refrigerators multiple times per day. The pharmacy team
spent weeks “chasing their tails” adjusting and readjusting units that had fallen out of
acceptable temperature range.
“Since switching,
we have not
experienced
temperature
excursions, and
the units maintain
their setpoint.”
THE CHALLENGES OF TEMPERATURE CONTROL
The problem of temperature-controlled transportation and storage is not new in the
medical industry, however in recent years, particularly with the advent of biologic
medications, the medical cold chain has become a critical and central component in
the healthcare industry with manufacturers and health systems spending millions of
dollars each year to produce, transport, and store temperature sensitive medications,
vaccines, and other necessary patient care material.
Improper temperature storage can have potentially dangerous health risks to
patients. Improper storage can reduce the effectiveness of vaccines, medications,
and diagnostic tools. Exposure to improper storage can render some vaccines
inert and can lead to a false sense of security with patients believing that they are
protected from certain ailments, when they are not. Improper storage can also reduce
the potency of medications, resulting in poor patient outcomes, and reagents and
samples stored at improper temperatures can create testing inaccuracies that can
lead to misdiagnosis.
Surprisingly, until recently, regulations on refrigerators for use in healthcare settings
were relatively lax. Many patient care settings relied on food-grade refrigerators
to store medications. However, recognizing the potential risk to patients, the CDC
released the Vaccine Handling Toolkit with recommendations that vaccines be stored
in purpose-built units both to protect temperature sensitive materials and to reduce
the burden on staff for manual monitoring and adjustment.
THE SOLUTION
Constant monitoring and adjustment of eighty-fve refrigerators and freezers, many
of which were non-medical-grade units, spread across the central pharmacy and
throughout the nursing foors was an unsustainable arrangement for this respected
hospital.
Every minute spent outside of proper storage temperature, hospital resources and
patient health were at risk, and the overloaded staff struggled to keep up with the
necessary adjustments each time a unit fell out of the acceptable temperature range.
It was clear that standardizing to medical-grade cold-storage would be imperative for
this health system to maintain their commitment to delivering the best outcomes for
patients and the best experiences for staff.
THE BENEFITS
While standardization required signifcant upfront investment, the benefts were clear.
•
Reduced clinical staff-hours spent adjusting out-of-range units
•
Reduced biomedical staff-hours spent repairing low-quality units
•
Reduced risk of material and reputation loss to the hospital
•
Reduced health risk to the patient
“These units are
reliable and
consistent, which is
a huge relief for me
and my team, as
the previous units
were a big point of
stress and difÏcult
to manage.”
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CASE STUDY
Given these benefts, the pharmacy manager decided to swap out all eighty-fve of
her cold storage units in favor of medical-grade, NSF/ANSI 456 certifed GX Solutions
cold storage units from Helmer Scientifc.
After replacing her eighty-fve mismatched units with GX solutions refrigerators, the
pharmacy manager had this to say:
“Since switching, we have not experienced temperature excursions, and the units
maintain their setpoint. They are reliable and consistent, which is a huge relief for me
and my team, as the previous units were a big point of stress and diffcult to manage.”
In addition to peace of mind and reduced staff burden, the hospital has experienced
several unexpected benefts from standardizing.
•
Reduction in noise output – At roughly the noise output of a quiet library, Helmer
GX solutions reduce distractions and improve experience on patient foors.
•
Effciency from standardization – Staff need only learn the systems once and can
successfully operate any cold storage unit in the hospital.
•
Reduced down-time – As a bulwark for reliability in the medical-grade refrigeration
industry, Helmer’s GX Solutions are designed and tested to perform under
extreme conditions, providing performance and reliability for the long-term.
•
Repair and maintenance effciencies – Since all eighty-fve units are Helmer units,
the biomedical staff requires technical knowledge for fewer units, allowing for
easier and faster repairs, more effcient preventative maintenance, and the ability
to carry replacement parts on-hand.
When asked about the investment to standardize to Helmer GX Solutions cold storage
units, the pharmacy manager replied, “Switching to Helmer refrigerators has been a
night and day difference.”
The standardization process was so successful that the health system has now added
Helmer cold storage units as a standard part of the blueprint for any facility expansion
or renovation.
CONCLUSION
Medical-grade cold storage is imperative for hospitals and health systems that value
patient outcomes. Trends in diagnostics and medicine demand higher volume and
higher levels of precision for temperature sensitive materials.
The increased demand for cold storage will add operational complexity for both
clinical staff and biomedical teams. Investing in reliable cold storage across
the care setting can reduce complexity by creating uniform processes for staff
operators, reducing technical knowledge burden on biomedical teams, streamlining
parts ordering and, as the pharmacy manager put it, “having the peace of mind is
priceless”.
“Switching
to Helmer
refrigerators has
been a night and
day difference.”
“Having the
peace of mind is
priceless.”
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Case Study -Health System Standardizes on Helmer Cold Storage .indd 3
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CASE STUDY
Learn More
Standardizing with
GX Solutions
Consistency, visibility, and less
risk for sensitive pharmaceuticals,
vaccines, and biologics
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