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breakdowns, because it can potentially cause harm to patients, which is a huge risk with regard to incident reports and legal involve- ment. And just making sure that you’re meeting the expectations of the referring physician that ordered the equipment. And training of personnel on the equipment, with handling patients, and what they need to do to make sure that the patient understands how to operate the equipment.
Again, getting back to inventory, it always really surprised me when a provider would say, “Well, we don’t know where all of our equipment is. We know where most of it is, but not all of it.” Well, your money is tied to your equipment, so you really need to know where it is at all times. So certainly, equipment management is directly related to the bottom line.
HMEB: Of course, equipment isn’t solely located
in the warehouse. For example, there’s equipment in the delivery vans, which are often treated like inventory locations. How does that factor into their equipment management?
Canally: An HME provider might have 10 vehicles that need to be kept up with all of their oil changes and everything. I mean, you don’t want the vehicle to break down on your way to Mr. Jones’s house.
How you store the equipment within the vehicle is also critical. You need to make sure to protect the equipment and that it’s secure.
You don’t want oxygen tanks flying in your van, so the safety of the vehicles is important.
Also important: the infection control related to the management of your delivery item, making sure it’s bagged and tagged appropriately, and that there’s no cross-contamination. If you have dirty equipment and clean equipment in the same vehicle at the same time, do you have an infection control kit with a gown and gloves and hand sani- tizer and all the things that are necessary? Sometimes a provider will pick up a piece of equipment that needs to be curbside cleaned before they even put it in the van.
So there are all these things that come into play — with managing the equipment, with managing your fleet — that relate directly to quality standards by the accreditors.
HMEB: If you had to narrow down some key bits of advice for providers that need to get their equip- ment maintenance into order, what would you say? Canally: First, make sure that you have the manufacturer guide- lines for all of your equipment. Verify and validate the location of all your inventory. And make sure that you have documentation of the equipment’s history: where it has been, any breakdowns, repairs, or preventive maintenance. And certainly, the tracking of the break- down is key to a well-run DME business. And communicating that breakdown to the manufacturer is very beneficial. n
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Payer Documentation
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