Supply Chain Management Based Essential Drugs Distribution Mode For Community Health Institutions

Objective:Under the background of healthcare reform, the community health service mode and the essential medicines policy now are government's the most powerful lever to alleviate and improve the availability of basic healthcare. So couple with the medicine circulation, the paper draws the supply chain management (SCM) theory and mode into the essential medicines'supplying for the primary health institutions further explores an efficient and economic medicines circulation mechanism both for theory and practice.Resource and MethodLiteratures study and review which related to the healthcare supply chain management (SCM) as well as the interview among the macro, medium and micro policy experts and the insiders both from the demander and supplier along the medicine supply chain. Further the seminars in the feasibility of community health institutions implement SCM with the related experts.The 11 months'record of medicines'purchasing, sell and inventory of all community health institutions from one of the districts in Beijing are chosen as the data sample and made the data analyzing based on the Excel2003.To comprehend the application and achievement of SCM in the field of healthcare, understand the status quo of China's medicine circulation area and distribution and also the supply mode of the community health institutions through the synthesis within all the current documents. On this basis, the feasibility of SCM's application in community health institutions was explored and demonstrated with which the qualitative analysis and case study.Result1. Analyzed and induced the current medicine supply (main) mode in community health institutions and the tentative innovation from the view of the whole supply chain, further summarized the experience that include the medicine distribution mode, the level of informatization as well as the trade-off among the members of the chain, and indicated that the present situation of medicine's circulation and distribution is the root of the problems.2. Based on the study of medicine's circulation and distribution and the experience from the same field in foreign countries, suggested that the SCM would be the solution for the high cost during the supply and then the feasibility demonstration in practice which the future trend of the medicine circulation and distribution is the reference.3. Concluded the medication rule in community health institutions and it was necessary to franchise the community health service institutions in order to form an alliance in which the scale economies and the low cost would be fully achieved during the drug distribution through the uniform SCM. So the institutions could offer the differential service then attract more patients from the hospitals, and the alliance's income would be more than the individual aggregation.4. It should have an eye on the purchasing, forecasting and inventory controlling under the new environment which the logistic action must be correspond to the idea of SCM. There still were modes of inventory setting and demand forecasting for community health institutions which built on the base of medication rule, the example and the related data of the medicine inventory record which mentioned above.5. With the principle of "Benefit Mutual & Risk Shared", it hypothesized that there was a dynamic alliance under the pull environment and built a distribution mode based on the multi trade-off and the relevant indicators for assessment.Conclusions SuggestionsTheoretically, it is feasible to implement SCM and franchise in community health institutions. If the united distribution mode could work well, both the conception and operation must be updated and new logistic means such as JIT, ECR, etc. Meanwhile the 4PL also should be developed to achieve the value-added supply chain.Creations and ShortcomingsThe study is an interdisciplinary and intersectant that applies the SCM which is the cost-solution for the business operation into community health institutions'management and their essential drugs'distribution further an integrated distribution mode based on the study. In order to fully achieve the purpose so it suggests franchising the community health institutions and then the differential service offer would be possible. The medicine supply chain of community health institutions involves multi-stakeholders but how to maintain the relationship and coordinate conflict among these participators does not refer. Meanwhile because of the lack of the data accumulation on the medicine consumption, it is difficult to get a forecasting mode which is fit for the community health institutions, and have not sufficient knowledge on mathematic or computer, therefore the mode could not be solved or put the mode into practice to verify its effect...