Inventory management in the Public Hospitals: the case of Ankaase Government Hospital, Afrancho Government Hospital and Mowire Family Care Hospital
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Date
2015-04-21
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Abstract
The concern of all public hospitals has been how to effectively ensure adequate supply
of goods and equipment to ensure optimum supply and demand. In most public hospitals
as the problem has been, it‘s either an overstocking or under stocking leading to
shortage or surplus hence incurring avoidable cost. This study aimed at finding out how
effective inventory management was in selected public hospitals. The study adopted the
case study design with the research approach being mixed method (Qualitative&
Quantitative). The study employed both probability and non-probability random
sampling Techniques to sample 65 health workers in three hospitals in the Afigya
Kwabre District. Data were analyzed descriptively, whiles the qualitative responses
were analyzed thematically. The study identified that an appreciable number of hospital
staff understand the concept of inventory management (74.1%). The commonest
inventory technique used was the ABC method with majority 49.2(32/65) of the staff
admitting the use of requisition forms during the demand for goods from the stores.
Coding system continue to be used in itemizing goods at the stores department, however
this was done manually at the various units of the hospitals. The challenges that impede
upon the effective hospital inventory management include inaccurate level of inventory
management, delay of request poor record-keeping and over-supply. The effectiveness
of inventory in hospitals is crucial for effective health care delivery. This research has
brought to the fore the gaps in the inventory management in the selected public
hospitals. A concerted effort need to be put in place to recruit skilled purchasing and
supply persons with ample training to manage inventory. More to it is the call for a
network and systematize inventory processes to track all inventory in the hospitals.
Description
A project work submitted to the Department of Building
Technology, Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and
Technology, in partial fulfillment of the requirement for
the degree of Masters of Procurement Management.