Safety-cost trade-offs in medical device reuse: a Markov decision process model

Healthcare expenditures in the US are approaching 2 trillion dollars, and hospitals and other healthcare providers are under tremendous pressure to rein in costs. One cost-saving approach which is gaining popularity is the reuse of medical devices which were designed only for a single use. Device makers decry this practice as unsanitary and unsafe, but a growing number of third-party firms are willing to sterilize, refurbish, and/or remanufacture devices and resell them to hospitals at a fraction of the original price. Is this practice safe? Is reliance on single-use devices sustainable? A Markov decision process (MDP) model is formulated to study the trade-offs involved in these decisions. Several key parameters are examined: device costs, device failure probabilities, and failure penalty cost. For each of these parameters, expressions are developed which identify the indifference point between using new and reprocessed devices. The results can be used to inform the debate on the economic, ethical, legal, and environmental dimensions of this complex issue.