Centralized administrative services management

Virtually every hospital has imposed guidelines or controls on one or more administrative service expenses. However, the actual deployment of such strategies is often voluntary, decentralized, disjointed and episodic. An alternative approach is to cluster administrative elements across hospital departments and make them the responsibility of a dedicated manager. This approach treats administrative services as an organizing principle with uniform, predictable standards of service and cost. Customer requirements for products and services are met without the need for them to physically manage that process. Materiel managers can demonstrate a leadership role by applying their professionalism and know-how to a set of products and services traditionally ignored or dealt with in an uncoordinated manner. While some initial resistance can be expected as traditional barriers are disassembled, the results should be very rewarding for the hospital and materiel manager alike.