Inventory to go: can stockless deliver efficiency?

Influenced by the Japanese management concept of "just-in-time," healthcare organizations are looking to their departmental inventories for possible cost reductions. Some organizations have developed a materials management technique known as stockless inventory, in which much of the management of an organization's supplies is switched to an outside vendor. By eliminating its storeroom and many of the staffing needs that go along with it, a hospital with a stockless inventory program can realize significant cost savings. Whether these savings offset potentially large service fees is a question each hospital must decide on its own.